Mementos
by Shining Zephyr
Summary: One-shot collection. Anything goes. **26. Exposed: Crossover with Chuck- Danny's faltered powers force him to reveal his identity to one particular member of Team Bartowski. And it's not who you think it is.**
1. Trapped

**As mutantlover09 once told me in a review, the plot bunnies are working me over time. Oh, geez. Fear the little hopping fuzz balls. Yep, this is a drabble challenge and random filler fic. –shrugs- Hope you like it. **

**Last time I checked… nope, still don't own the show. Wow. That's a record…**

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1. Trapped

_Under the car, too weak to become Phantom… _

It was nighttime in Amity Park, and darkness had fallen over the city like a blanket. There were times like these that passed and it seemed almost too perfect a night to simply gaze at the stars and wonder about life's mysteries. When one could sleep peacefully, knowing Danny Phantom would save the city if a ghost appeared. Where one had no idea of how horribly fate would change the city's life forever.

Funny how destiny would change a fifteen year old's life within a matter of seconds. He was under the car, too weak to move or cry out for help. It had been like this for the past few hours. How had a teenager his age get stuck in a situation like this, and for the first time in his life, not be able to get out of it? He was a hybrid. He could become a ghost and faze through the car that lay on top of him.

Seemed simple enough.

But it wasn't.

As Danny Fenton lay there, hand clawing for any way out, he began to think back about times he had been in worse positions. Running from animals, taking blows for others, anything and everything that made him into what he was today. So why was he under this vehicle, unable to do anything but moan in a raspy voice for help, in which no one could here him? Was it supposed to end like this? Was he supposed to die now?

No. No, he wasn't.

A voice came from the outside. Movement. "Daniel?"

Oh, god. Not him. Not Vlad Masters. Or was it Plasmius? Either way, it was that fruit looped idiot who might not have got him here in the first place, but he probably sure as hell wasn't going to help him out of there. He moved slightly. How long had it been now? Five hours? "Plasmius," he rasped, his hand moving. "Please."

The man looked confused and bent down. "What are you doing under there, little badger? Having problems squirming out of your predicament?"

"Please," he pleaded, failing to reach him. "I need your help."

The billionaire blinked, and then let out a small chuckle. It was nearly inaudible, but it was there, to say the least. "Oh, no, I'm afraid I can't, my boy. You see, you need to be taught a lesson in simply learning to let go."

Danny's heart beat slower with each passing moment. "No. Please, I _need_ your help. Why can't you just lift the car up and we can be enemies again?"

"Because," Vlad said simply, getting up. "Your time has come, Danny. It's your judgment day, and that's all it will ever be." He turned around. "The night that Danny Fenton died will be a night that no one will be able to forget. Trapped under a car and too weak to even become Danny Phantom. My, I feel stunned at that."

"Stunned?" Danny asked, trying to shift himself, a surge of pain rushing through his body. How scarred was he? How badly had he been bruised, beaten, and left for dead? "How could you be stunned at my death, you murderer?"

Here, the forty year old half-ghost shook his head. "Daniel, I didn't kill you."

He barely heard this, drifting in and out of consciousness. Something told him that he was lying, but he couldn't quite place his finger on it. What was Vlad trying to tell him? That he didn't kill Danny? What kind of bullcrap was that? Of course he killed him. Didn't everyone know that? All the same, his voice cracked as he spoke. "Yes, you did!" he tried to shout, but it came out as a whisper.

"No, I didn't."

Danny pondered this, trying to morph. The rings appeared and disappeared almost instantaneously. No energy left but for that of survival. He squirmed some more, moving nowhere but an inch. "Then who did, fruit loop? Who killed me and not you, the villainous Vlad Plasmius?"

"I did."

Now he was really confused. "But you just said…"

"No, no, no, no, no, Daniel," Vlad explained, getting a kick out of this. "It wasn't Vlad _Masters_ that killed you. It was Vlad _Plasmius_ that committed the crime."

That seriously messed around with Danny's mind for a little bit. How long had they been going at the conversation? Hours? Minutes? Seconds? Danny couldn't tell. He had no sense of time anymore. His internal clock had broken, as did his spirit. What had happened to him in that span of several hours? The sun had come up, it was a normal day, he had gone to school, and now he was almost dead under a car.

And it was all because of Vlad.

Who cared about the last name?

A flash of light appeared, and wind rustled up dirt and gravel under the car. Danny fought to not shut his eyes. 'No,' he thought desperately. 'No. Don't shut your eyes.'

"Good night, Daniel," Vlad smoothly told him- or Plasmius. "Sweet dreams. May your life in the afterlife be as wonderful as it was here… a living hell."

He that, he flew off, Danny's hand no longer moving. He couldn't move anymore. "Please," he tried to talk. "Please, Plasmius. Don't do this. Don't leave me."

His eyes began to close. He began to drift to a wonderland unlike anything he ever knew. Danny began to journey to heaven.

And all his foe could do when he begged for help was chuckle and offer him final thoughts. Not comforting ones, but they were his last thoughts.

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**Oh, man… emotionally draining, to say the least. So, can anyone get the reference? Or do I have to splurge next chapter? I do accept challenges, as it said in the summary. How did I do? Reviews are appreciated. Thanks for reading. **


	2. Revelation

**Challenges, challenges, challenges. And to think, I won't go on my usual Danny and Vlad sort of thing. Yay for me! And to my reviewers and readers: **Fernclaw **wins at guessing the reference. That CSI: season finale kind of left us all hanging by a thread. Her challenge is next. **

**By the way, want to use one of these ideas? Go ahead. Live bait! Just credit the source to me. **

**Challenge by **Fernclaw.

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2. Revelation

_Her own son, gone by her actions… takes place during Public Enemies. _

"Wait a minute."

The white-haired, emerald-eyed teenager flinched at the harsh addressing of himself by Madeline Fenton. He turned around and looked at her, and for a fleeting moment, she thought she saw a raven-haired boy with sky blue eyes. She shook it off, though, when Danny Phantom spoke. "That's my cue to leave," he told her cheerfully, beginning to fly to the roof.

Her bazooka went off, hitting him in an upward motion right to the stomach. Phantom screamed in pain as he fell for the ground and hit granite with a sickening THUD! It seemed like nanoseconds to her when he landed, and in moments, he was moaning in pain and lying on his side, clutching his rib cage. She pointed the gun at him. "All right, ghost. Tell me something: why haunt Amity Park, huh?"

"Listen!" he asked weakly, wincing. "Just hear me out! Not all ghosts are evil! There are those who want to save the city as much as you do, and I'm one of those people!"

She narrowed her eyes in suspicion but lowered her gun all the same. "I'm taking you back to the lab. We might talk. If you're lying, you're toast."

He nodded, barely registering her voice as he faded into unconsciousness.

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The teenage hybrid opened his eyes and… couldn't move. Phantom wearily tried to look at his surrounding in what appeared to be pure darkness in a strange sort of light. He tried to feel around with his hand but couldn't move more so than an inch. Seemed cylindrical, given the status of how the wall felt. A familiar cylindrical…

Wait a second. He was _inside_ the thermos. _Inside_ the very Fenton Thermos he used to catch ghosts. He laughed silently, bitterly to himself. Was this irony or did fate have some sort of cruel plan for him?

The top suddenly opened, and Phantom found himself in the outside world alive. Sure, he was dizzy and sick with dread, but he was alive. His eyes adjusted to the bright light quickly as he quietly floated in the room. It was eerily silent as he began to look around for anything out of place. His mom wasn't there. Jazz, Sam, and Tucker were nowhere to be found. So who decided to let him out of the canister that held ghosts? He turned around a moment later, Maddie holding the gun in one hand, aiming it at him warily. He began to back away. "Look, I thought I told you this. I'm not evil!"

"Ghosts always lie like that," the ghost-huntress explained, as if it was so obvious. The weapon was charging. Thirty seconds to firing.

He looked at her pleadingly. "Please. You've got to believe me, Mom… I mean, Maddie. Right, Maddie… heh-heh." He laughed nervously. Options were running out as the gun began to hum to life. What could he do? Fly out of the room? Fat chance that would happen. The Ghost Shield was probably up. Reveal his identity? Maddie might shoot him… or die of shock. Talk some sense into her?

Last resort.

Twenty five seconds.

She narrowed her eyes. "Trying to call me your mother? If I didn't have to wait any longer, I'd blast you into ectoplasm for that remark. You're no son of mine!"

Fifteen seconds.

Phantom growled. "Will you listen to me?!"

"You're evil, Phantom. You always have been, and you always will be!"

A strange fire lit in his eyes. "Get off your damn parade float and read my lips: I'M NOT EVIL!"

Five… four… three… two… one…

The gun went off. In slow motion, Phantom's eyes widened with shock as the blast from the bazooka hit him square in the chest. He went flying back ten feet into the wall and slammed into the iron-clad building. It burned him as he slid down the wall, screaming in pain. He landed on the floor with a nasty crunch, Maddie's gun smoking and pointed at the boy. He took a deep, shaking breath, blood beginning to slowly seep from his chest area. He began shaking, two rings of light splitting down his body and revealing the raven-haired boy she had seen before.

Her own son.

Danny began to weep, quiet wracking sobs echoing in her ears as she rushed over to comfort the one whom she had shot. Her son, the one she loved.

The one she had been hunting. He opened his eyes and tried to smile weakly, but only a sad spark in his eyes remained. "Mom," he managed to whisper.

The sobs began to subside, the shaking ceasing to exist. Maddie began to feel for a pulse as it slowly drifted away from his body. She held his head in her arms, rocking him back and forth as slowly but surely, the light went out in his eyes. "Danny?" she whispered, horrified at what she had done. "Danny?"

It was gone. There was nothing more in the hybrid's eyes except for an empty darkness no soul could penetrate.

"Danny?! Oh, dear god, no. Danny!"

No response.

"DANNY!"

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**I tried, Fernclaw. I really did. Another draining and emotional piece. I'm trying so hard, gang. Reviews are appreciated. Thanks for reading. **


	3. Abyss

**Plushiemon asks why I'm writing one-shot angst fics. Doi. It's my job as a writer to make you all weep and flood the city of ** **Amity Park****. When you visit there, of course… **

**Challenge by **Plushiemon.

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3. Abyss

_A never ending space of darkness is where they both belonged… _

The abyss of darkness. One always wonders what lies in there. Is it insanity, despair, hate, rage? No one knows about this except one person. Vlad Plasmius, or Vlad Masters, depending on your point of view as a citizen or a ghost teenager, has lived in this place and always will. It swallows him whole, gives him power, energy, and desire for anything he wants. Sometimes, he does try to dig out of that hole and find a light to humanity, but it simply grabs him and keeps a hold on his neck, forcing him deeper into the dark.

Plasmius wants to drag another person into the hole with him. His name is Danny Fenton, or Danny Phantom, and every day, he continues reaching for his goal of having the boy as his son. To mold him into the hybrid he was meant to be. The more Plasmius tries to take him, the more Phantom fights back. So he pulls even harder.

And once, he nearly did pull him under.

"Ah. Daniel."

The phantom teen's eyes widened, hands alight with green energy. "What do you want? Can't you leave me alone in peace?"

Plasmius stroked his bearded chin in amusement. "I haven't bugged you for the past week and a half, my boy. You act like it's a nightmare for me to try and talk to you. Is it that much of a problem?"

Phantom blinked, confused by this. His hands stopped glowing for a moment. "What are you up to now?"

He raised an eyebrow. "I always have to have some sort of plot in mind when I face you. Fine. I confess. I have a plot in mind for you."

The teen hybrid's hand began to glow again with ecto-energy. "I'm listening."

Plasmius' hand became alive with pink energy. "I'm going to pull you into the dark abyss of despair, Daniel. You know the old saying: misery loves company."

Phantom smirked. "And in this case, it'd be a cat."

The billionaire gritted his teeth. "That's beside the point, little badger." He shot a ghost ray at the boy, who jumped out of the way and fired one of his own. Plasmius growled in anger and put up a ghost shield. "Stop fighting me. I know for a fact that you are too weak to defeat me!"

Phantom roared, throwing himself for the man with all his strength. Amazingly enough, he knew that the child was going to attempt to inflict damage upon him. He grabbed the teen's arms and suddenly whirled him around right into the tree. Phantom's eyes suddenly widened as Plasmius held him against the wood, red eyes full of hate and malice. He glared at the forty year old defiantly. "What's wrong, fruit loop? Lost your edge and deciding to shove innocent ghost children into the wall?"

Plasmius brought his fist into the teen's stomach. "Damnit, Danny. Is that you think of me as?"

He screamed in pain, tears stinging his eyes. "What is wrong with you?!"

The male grinned, plunging another punch into the solar plexus. "The abyss of darkness is for half-breeds like you and I, my child. The power it has given me is more than any pleasure I could get from you. If you joined me in that endless fall, I could make you the most powerful hybrid known to humankind! Daniel, people would _fear_ you!"

"Never!" Phantom sneered through gritted teeth.

Plasmius merely sighed. "Your loss."

He nearly punched the boy with an ecto-filled hand, but Phantom stunned him, spitting blood onto his face. The taste of his own had been coming from his stomach and into his mouth, feeling very sickening- unlike anything he had ever known. Plasmius dropped him, and he managed to kick the half ghost aside, wiping his face. Blood was still in his mouth as he winced with disgust and fear. "No, Vlad. It's _your_ loss."

With an inhumane snarl, Plasmius crashed into Phantom, both landing into the lake of Amity Park. The two creatures fought and struggled, Plasmius pulling on Phantom's leg deeper into the water. The boy wrenched himself to the surface, his archenemy still gripping his leg. He wanted to go up, but Plasmius dragged him down and slammed the teen into the ground. He heard a bone crack. His arm had broken, and all Plasmius was doing was landing punches and kicks into the stomach and the head.

"Fuck it!" he screeched at the top of his lungs. "Get off of me!"

He clenched up and bellowed, his most powerful Ghostly Wail being unleashed upon his foe. Plasmius went flying back into the air and away from the scene, so it appeared. He moaned angrily and tried to get up. The guy had problems. What was this about an abyss that he was going to be dragged into?

An abyss of darkness? Was that even possible?

Plasmius stood over him again. Sure, he was bruised, battered, and bloodied, but there was still the look on his face. He was pissed off, and anyone could have seen that when he grabbed a newly morphed Danny Fenton by his raven-messed hair and stared into his eyes. Danny began to feel disoriented, sick, and in and out of the world in which he lived. The last thing he heard before he went into pure unconsciousness was Plasmius' mocking voice.

_ "You will join me, Daniel. You will join me in the abyss of darkness…"_

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**Due to Plushiemon's extremities for angst and depression, there will more than likely be another thing based off of this experience. Man, Plasmius was evil in this. Reviews are appreciated. Much love, friends. Thanks for reading.**


	4. Darkness

**I can't think of anything right now that has to go with one word. Although I do have something in mind for another. Yes, _more_ angst. Can't think of anything humorous at the moment… Could be considered sequel to "Abyss." **

**Challenge by **tsubasahope

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4. Darkness 

_Wandering in the shadows… is there any way out of it? _

"I'm nothing like you!"

The raven haired teen struggled against his foe's iron-grasp to the bed as he floated above, forcing the teen to stay where he was. His red eyes bore into the boy's blue ones, a strange sort of anger in there. "You have never understood the darkness that threatens us all. You have it more than anyone, Daniel. Embrace it! Take care of it, and it can blossom into the greatest flower of all eternity!"

Danny Fenton struggled on the bed. "I want you to get off of me!"

Vlad Plasmius sighed and did as the boy requested, which stunned him, to say the least. He floated in the middle of the room, shaking his head. "I'm going to make you understand, Danny. Even if it takes me a lifetime." With this, he floated out of the room through the wall, and he was left by himself.

Danny looked at his arm and winced, tears stinging his eyes. Did he need the torture of being cooped up in his enemy's house with no way out and all doors being watched by him? He almost wished that Plasmius would go after his mom and not him. _Almost._ The way that he pursued the boy was almost like he loved him in a not-so-son sort of sense. Not gay, though, either. Like a long lost lover that refused to disappear into the darkness.

He got up and walked to the door, opening it and stepping out into the hallway. It was nighttime, and the entire house was engulfed in a dark and eerie feeling as he morphed into Phantom, the cast still around his arm. "There's no way I'm fighting Plasmius like this," he grumbled, floating and beginning to search for a way out. His arm twanged again in pain.

There was a soft whoosh from behind him.

He whirled around and growled. Being in houses like this was annoying, but when you factored in that you couldn't see two inches in front of your face, it made for a completely different setting. His hand began to glow lightly to see where he was going a little better as he floated down the hallway, one arm wrapped in a sling.

Another whoosh. This time louder.

He swallowed and took a deep breath. 'Come on, dude, you're hallucinating,' he sternly thought to himself. 'You know there are such things called ghosts, but the shadows that terrorize us is ourselves. Remember that.'

He continued floating down the hall.

"Going somewhere, little badger?" a voice whispered in his ear.

Phantom jumped and whirled around, gasping for air. Plasmius stood behind him, looking madly triumphant. "Trying to escape, were you?"

Phantom took a step back. "No. No I wasn't…"

Plasmius grabbed him by the shoulders, his nails digging deeper into the boy's flesh. "You are going to live here with me in the darkness, Daniel. Remember, misery loves company. And you are just what I need to stay alive."

He closed his eyes, wincing from the pain. "Let go of me. Please!"

"Never again, my boy," he laughed, hands beginning to glow with energy. "I will take you as my son, and you will see everything that I have to offer. The darkness has embraced you, Daniel. Why don you not embrace it back?"

Phantom's eyes looked at his sling, then into Plasmius' eyes. "I have no fear of it," he told the male calmly, no longer worried about being hurt by this vampire that wanted, at one point, to murder him. "You don't see the light that embraces you. Don't you get it, Vlad? I finally managed to find it in this house.

"The darkness does not embrace me. It is you who embrace me. You, my embodiment of darkness. I want the light, but you try and cover my eyes and don't allow me to see what the truth is. I want nothing more but the truth of what I was meant to be, not these lies that corrupt me for what I'm supposed to be.

"Leave me alone, Vlad. The darkness never tempted me. But it overshadowed you."

Plasmius blinked, staring at the boy, green blood now dripping down his fingers from digging his nails into Phantom's flesh. Is this what he thought of him, only trying to embrace the darkness? He glared at him. "Is that is how you believe what I am trying to accomplish for you, little badger…"

He threw Phantom to the floor. He screamed in pain when landing on his arm.

"…then have it your way. But know this. If you believe in the light and not the dark, I will continue haunting you, and I will make it my personal goal to make you see the darkness of life."

With this, he teleported away, and Phantom was left alone in the darkness. He couldn't see again, his hand emitting a soft glow in the hallway. He picked himself up, trying to figure out a way out of the house. Shaking his head, he headed back to the guest room and opened the door. He could simply escape through the window if he wanted to. Phantom looked out the window and opened it, allowing the breeze to blow in a soft sort of thunder booming in the distance.

It was true. Plasmius could not suck him into the darkness.

But he might drag him into that same place without even knowing it.

Besides, that factor had already come true.

In a way, he already was one with the dark. And that half of him was trapped in a thermos in another dimension far from where he watched the clouds roll in…

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**Okay, that was kind of nice to do. Hey, tsubabsahope, hope you liked it. Reviews are appreciated. If you're lucky and everything goes well, maybe I'll get another one up today. Much love, friends. Thanks for reading. **


	5. Rain

**-sighs- Okay, so I lied. Fluff has arrived, and _it has nothing to do with him_. No challenges for this chapter. Only a one-shot of my picking. –is shot- This is what happens when a ghost phan and kitties mix…**

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5. Rain 

_It was a beautiful thing to look at, to embrace. _

"Mommy!" he yelled out happily, pointing to the clearing skies. "Look! The rain stopped coming! Can we go outside?"

Madeline Fenton smiled at her five year old son as he struggled to see out the window. "It stopped raining?"

He jumped up and down. "Please, Mom? I want to go and jump around in the puddles! Look!" He pointed out the window again and saw a girl with black hair and wearing a black skirt jumping around in them as well. "Sam's outside! Please?" He looked up at her with puppy-dog eyes.

She sighed. "All right. But I'm going to watch you from the porch, all right?"

"Yay!" He bolted up the stairs and began to hastily put on his shoes. Maddie sighed and shook her head in amusement, putting on her boots as well. It was rare when she saw her son and the girl from across the street together like this. Sam was a nice girl in her mind, too. Sure, just a little shy of her son, but it was in a good way. Moments later, he came downstairs and opened the door, running outside and proceeding to jump into a puddle.

A loud splash, follwed by a wave of water preceded this instance, and in an instant, Sam Manson saw her friend and waved happily. "Danny!"

"Hey, Sam!" he yelled back, trying to run to her and not slip into a puddle. "Mom said I could splash around in the puddles with you!"

Maddie raised an eyebrow. "I didn't say that!" she called out in a warning tone, but all the same, she consented to his wish, and the little couple began to jump in the various water puddles that surrounded the apartment complexes of Amity Park. She smiled to himself. Danny had become adventurous these days- mainly at school and perhaps at home, but one wouldn't think that he didn't have a spark of a child left in him.

Naturally, Danny's parents had taught him about ghosts, but he thought it was a game. He would run around the house and pretend to fight ghosts, making shooting noises and such at times. Jack had always joked that he "had his mother's ghost-fighting genes" in him.

Was that true?

"DANNY!" Sam shrieked, snapping the woman out of her gaze. "You got my skirt soaked!"

The boy ran over to the unknown Goth and tried to brush away the water, but he was failing miserably. "I'm sorry, Sam," he told her, looking at her sadly and wrapping his arms around her. "I won't do it again."

Her eyes widened. "Ew! Danny gave me cooties!"

"Did not!" the young boy shot back.

"Did too!"

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

This began a series of kicking splashes as Maddie watched amusingly at the two kids, prepared to intervene at any moment. It was then that she noticed that a large cat-like ghost was beginning to crawl near them, fangs bared and bristling. She jumped up, her motherly instinct kicking in alongside her ghost hunting expertise. "Kids!" she yelled. "Run!"

Danny looked at her mom. "But you told us not to run when the street was wet, Mom!"

"Never mind that, just go!"

Danny took Sam's hand and ran into the house, Maddie following close behind. She slammed the door behind them, taking a deep breath. Sam looked at Danny. "Why did you drag me?"

"Because Mom called for both of us," he explained, looking at her. "What is it, Mom?"

The cat ghost fazed through the door, beginning to advance on the trio in the house. Danny blinked. He began to walk towards the ghost slowly. Maddie's eyes widened with fear. "Daniel James Fenton, you get back here this instant!"

He looked at the ghost huntress. "Maybe it just needs a hug, Mom."

"I don't care if it was begging for a kitty treat; get back here right now!"

Sam had an idea. She ran into the kitchen and came back moments later with a bowl of milk and looked at the cat. "Maybe he's hungry," she suggested, completely oblivious to Danny's stare.

"I think he needs a scratch behind the ears," he told her proudly. "Maybe then he'll go away. Mommy says that ghosts always attack when they're angry. Maybe we can make him happy and he'll go away."

The boy began to scratch behind the ears of the creature and Sam put down the bowl of milk. To Maddie's astonishment, the cat sat down and began to lick the milk and purr when the boy scratched behind his ears. Sam began to pet his fur. "He's cute."

Danny nodded. "Do you think we can keep him?"

Maddie shook her head. "I'm afraid not, Danny. Ghosts aren't meant to be kept as pets."

"Awww," the two children whined.

"Don't you 'awww' me," she told the two friends in a firm voice, although her eyes were soft and kind. "I will not be taking care of a ghost cat while your father or I are living under this roof. That's going to attract more ghosts, and that's the last thing we need around here."

Sam looked outside the window again and groaned. "It's raining again!"

Indeed, the water began to pelt against the window as the trio sat in the room with a ghost cat, who had finished his milk. He meowed and fazed through the door, almost like saying "Thank you" to the kids and the mother. Sam looked at Danny and smiled. "Do you ever think that one day, we'll be able to get a cat?"

Sam giggled. "Yeah! And we can get it toys and food and a bed and he can sleep with me!"

"I want him, too!"

Maddie softly chuckled as she listened to the two friends argue about a cat for themselves. Even she had to admit that the ghost cat was cute when calm and docile. But she could never tell that to anyone.

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**Okay, so I'm being fluffy. DON'T HURT ME! –cowers- Must know how I did. And I picked a cat because I like them_. NOT BECAUSE OF HIM._** **Anyways, reviews are enjoyed. Thanks for reading. **


	6. Ferry

**And as I flip out from lack of inspiration, I give you all another one-shot from my weak mind right now. Have I lost it? Eh, no. At least, I hope not...**

**EDIT (8/21/2008) Props to **Writers-BlockDP **for finding the error of my ways!**

**Challenge by** Devianta

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6. Ferry

_Some boats are the way of love…_

Twenty years. Twenty years had passed since they had defeated Vlad Plasmius, saved the world, and he had become the mayor of Amity Park. Ups and downs had occurred, naturally, and one of those had been finally having his crush from high school and having her hand in marriage. With the little bit of money he had, he bought a house boat for their honeymoon, taking it the some-odd miles to Lake Michigan and giving it the test run before finally allowing his wife onto the wedding present he gave her.

That was fifteen years ago.

She loved it so much. They had been together for literally one-seventh of a century, and life was good for the both of them. They had no children yet, but Mrs. Valerie Foley was on her way to bearing her first newborn son within a matter of weeks. She rubbed her stomach and smiled, gazing out over the water. Her hair blew slightly in the breeze from the coasting of the _Celestial Arrow_ as her husband got down from the loft of the boat. "We're sailing at thirty knots now, dear," he told her, kissing her cheek as he took a seat on the chair facing the water. "We should be at the cabin in around an hour."

"An hour?!" she cried out in mock anger. "Isn't that a wait?"

Tucker Foley grinned at this and pulled out his PDA. "Perhaps," he told her slyly, beginning to type furiously on the device. "Maybe I want to stay a little bit longer out on the water today."

Valerie smiled and shook her head. "He's kicking."

"He? With your ghost hunting abilities, Val, I would've thought it was a girl."

She laughed. "As if."

Deep down, though, something was troubling her. Ghost-hunting. Tucker hadn't called Danny in the past six months, despite the numerous requests on the answering machine that he call him back. Danny and Sam married around eight years ago, finally allowing full bloom of their relationship at twenty-seven years old. She sighed and glanced out over the seas. "Ever thought about calling Danny back?"

Tucker looked thoughtful and began punching in some numbers. Valerie got up from the chair and walked into the kitchen portion of the boat. She began to pull out some things to make herself a sandwich, beginning to listen to her husband's voice speak with his friend for life and remembering the times when they went to high school together. Samantha Manson, the Goth. Tucker, the geek. Danny Fenton.

Danny Fenton.

She stopped and thought for a moment. Where could she place him? He wasn't ever popular around school, to say the least, but he wasn't a nerd, either. After discovering the whole secret identity thing that he had, she was surprised, to say the least. Actually, surprised was an understatement. She was stunned beyond belief… and understanding. Sure, her heart nearly broke in two when he told her that he and Sam were an icon together, but what got her even more was the hybrid telling her that Tucker was in serious need of someone.

Truth was, she kind of had a crush on the teen, too. Yet, if she admitted it to him, all the popular kids would practically exclude her from their conversations and whatnot. In senior year, she finally bucked up enough courage to tell the tech kid, and he nearly fainted with delight.

The rest, they say, is history.

"SAY WHAT?!"

Valerie was jolted out of her daze by Tucker's yell over the phone. "You've got to be kidding me! A kid?! You've got a kid?!" She made her way outside with her sandwich and sat back down on the chair, eating and eavesdropping on her husband's conversation. "…what? Only a little bit of ghost energy? Dude, you're telling me I'm the godfather? What did you name him?"

Silence.

Tucker's face soured over. "Shut up. You're kidding me, right? Tucker Jonathon Fenton? Oh, god, man. You named him after me."

Valerie laughed silently. A strange fish jumped out of the water. She reached for the digital camera and turned it on, secretly snapping a picture of Tucker's horrified face.

"Sam suggested Robert? I would've gone with Tucker any day," he snickered.

More silence.

"Hey, dude. I gotta go. Duty calls."

He hung up the phone and grabbed the side of the wall. "Val. You're a…"

"Godmother," she finished, halfway finished with her sandwich. "So I've heard. Tucker Jonathon Fenton." She smirked, rubbing her stomach again. "You should be flattered, sweetheart. When was the last time you heard that your friend decided to name a kid after you?"

Tucker stared at her, eyes wide. "The kid's got some ghostly traits from Danny. Says he disappears every now and then and has a tendency to blow a hole in the wall every time he wails, but other than that, nothing."

She looked at her stomach again, getting up and setting down the plate. She walked over to Tucker. "What're we going to name our child if it's a boy?"

"Danny. Danny Robert Fenton."

She embraced him. "I'm feeling seasick," she told him. "Let's go into the bedroom. You can rub my back while we discuss what we should name the child if it's a girl."

Tucker looked out over the water. "Check out the sunset."

"The sunset to another day in paradise," she told him, taking his arm and smiling. She pulled him gently into the bedroom and laid on the king size mattress, closing her eyes and remembering the first time that they made love. "The right side of my back, Tucker. I said the _right._ Come on, do you remember your directions?"

He smirked and began to smooth out the pain. "I'm working on it…"

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**Um, yeah. Hopefully, this was a success as much as the others. I'm going to our homecoming football game tonight so… yeah. Reviews are appreciated. Much love and thanks for reading.**


	7. Alone

**I have all the challenges written down in a book here, and I'm now going down the list. Maybe I should write fluff more often. But it's not my style. Enough condoning fluffy things: let's get something else in here… **

**Challenge by** Plushiemon

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7. Alone 

_Was someone really there for him? _

Huddled in his room, all alone with no one to comfort him anymore. No one seemed to take it lightly that he was a half human, half ghost. His parents nearly killed him. Sam and Tucker had been banished from the city. Jazz couldn't get in contact with him at all, being the doors were locked and no one could have access to his room before the Guys in White came by and picked him up to go to the facility for testing. He was scared, angry… he didn't expect this to happen to him.

He thought everyone would believe him.

But as he covered himself up in sheets, taking deep breaths and trying to calm his furiously beating heart, his mind began to drift to one person who would try to convince him that everyone was against him and only he would understand the boy's plight. He shuddered and looked at the phone, tempted to reach out and call him, but he fought against that thought and shrugged the blankets off himself. He stood up and looked around his room, tears welling up. His whole life was almost flashing right before his eyes, and he couldn't do one thing about it.

Or could he?

Danny Fenton swallowed, a ring of light splitting down his waist and revealing his ghostly counterpart whom he had grown accustomed to for the past several months. He nodded to himself reluctantly, poking his head out the window. "There he is!" a cry was heard, and multiple flashes of light went off. He pulled himself back in, scowling. Ever since the revelation of his identity, the news had followed him around like a pack of dogs. No privacy or comfort from anyone except his sister, and even then, she had a hard time trying to be alone with him.

He had to do it. There wasn't much of a choice any more. It was either become delusional due to the government, or seek refuge in another place- one which he hated with a passion. Quite the dilemma for a fifteen year old teenager to go through. Going intangible, he fazed through the roof and flew into the clouds. He became visible again, soaring towards a large mansion-like castle, hoping that this decision wasn't going to be his last. Besides, he would have lived with one seriously crazed up fruit loop any day than become a test subject.

Faster and faster he went towards Vlad Masters', or Vlad Plasmius', house, counting seconds of life under his breath.

He finally saw the great castle, speeding downwards and landing right on the lawn of the billionaire's property. He rushed up to the doors and knocked, panting and sweating like nothing he had ever done before. The doors opened, and a silver haired forty year old bachelor stared at the white haired, out-of-breath hybrid standing on his front porch. He blinked. "Daniel?"

He tried to calm himself down. "Vlad. You've got to help me."

"With what?" the half ghost questioned, a small grin playing on his lips. "My boy, your face has been showing all over the news as if you're the next Paris Hilton woman or whoever she is. Fame, fortune, glory. I thought you would've had everything right now. Why come and ask your archenemy for his assistance when you've claimed all you've wanted?"

Phantom morphed, a weak kneed Danny clutching to the door for support. "They want to kill me."

His heart nearly stopped beating, his face twisting into one of confusion. "What?"

"Vlad, they want to kill me!" he yelled, his voice hoarse from the screaming he had done at his parents only hours before. "They want to take my body apart and dissect my flipping body like I'm an animal! They're handing me over to the GIW in a couple hours if I stay there and huddle in my room!" He suddenly grabbed the bachelor's hand pleadingly, something Vlad thought he would never live to witness. "You've got to help me! Sam and Tucker are banished; the press is following me around like wolves, and Mom and Dad are waiting for the government to take me away!"

Vlad grabbed Danny's wrist and stared into his eyes. There was a strange sort of fiery passion in them as he narrowed his eyes and spoke. "Daniel James Fenton. You have got to pull yourself together. What the bloody hell happened to my little badger that would defy me in the face of danger and fight me with the strength of nothing ever seen by humans and ghosts alike? Where did that Danny Fenton go? From what I see, he disappeared a long time before he showed up on my doorstep." He let go of his wrist and smirked. "Besides, I have no time to take care of you. I am a business man."

"You're a fruit loop!" Danny hissed, clinging to the door with a superhuman effort. "You really think the old Danny Fenton disappeared?!"

Vlad crossed his arms, a black ring of light splitting down him. A vampire like ghost appeared in front of him, pointed teeth formed into a smile. "Well, the way you are acting so childish right now clearly states the obvious, my boy."

He clenched up angrily. Plasmius stared at him in the doorway. "Go work your magic, little badger. Show them that you are only what you choose to be. And if that means you still come back here after putting up a fight, I might, _just might,_ take you into my house."

The rings of light split down his body, and Phantom was off into the skies moments later. Plasmius chuckled to himself. "Oh, the things I do to make a difference in his life," he murmured, shutting the door to the outside world. "He's not alone in this world. He just has to see the ones who really care about him. And right now, he needs to find them. He can't come to me.

"At least, not yet."

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**Really awkward. This one's supposed to make you think. It made me think, that's for sure. I feel like this one almost made me feel strange inside. And I have nothing more to say… **


	8. Moon

**Fear a new idea in mind. I may as well get it out before people yell at me.**

**Danny and Vlad live under the same roof (Vlad is Danny's father) and the two of them do have their spats, but it's nothing unusual. Typical father-son sort of thing. One day, Danny gets ghost powers from fixing a portal located in the house. Vlad gets upset that Danny discovers this portal and forces Danny out of the house. Meanwhile, he moves to Amity Park, finds a girl named Sam and Tucker, goes into a family of ghost hunters and discovers he has ghost powers. (all at fifteen) Low and behold, a couple months later, a strange ghost appears by the name of Plasmius. Phantom and he fight each other, they become enemies, and blah blah blah. Yet, he still misses his father, but when he goes to see him again, Vlad is kind of upset at seeing him. Tosses him out, Danny becomes semi-bitter, and... **

**Yeah. That's what's going on so far.**

**Sorry about that. Tell me how it sounds! **

**Challenge by **Dante Inferno

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8. Moon

_Was it true that the dipstick was really falling for her? _

She had no idea. It all seemed like one big dream to her as she floated across the skies of Amity Park, fixing the strings on her guitar and making sure she could play the music that could make one fall in love within a moment's notice. She sighed and rolled her eyes, twisting and turning and grumbling under her breath. Sure, she didn't exactly fall for him, but…

Was she?

For all Ember McLain knew, her enemy Danny Phantom was just another average teenage ghost with nothing but a life and the ability to suck those stupid ghosts into his thermos. Okay, so she had been in there once, and it wasn't the most comfortable thing in the world. Actually, she hated it. No room to move around, no way to do anything she exactly wanted, per se, but once she was back in the Ghost Zone… well, that was a completely different story. Ember enjoyed Amity Park- and for a good reason. Love was everywhere, and she could make anything happen with her songs.

But was that true with Phantom?

"Ember!"

She turned around and groaned, noticing the ghost hybrid in a midair fighting stance. "Listen, dipstick, I'm not in the mood to fight you tonight," she told him flatly, looking down the arm of the guitar. She settled on some strings and slammed an "A" chord, throwing Phantom back somewhat with a large pink ecto-blast. "I know it takes really serious effort for you to believe that I'm sometimes out for here the heck of it and not to woo some kids, but that's your own point of view, isn't it?"

Phantom blinked for a moment, rubbing his head. "Excuse me?"

Ember sighed, holding the guitar by the neck and giving him a strange sort of look. "Someone's confused. Point being, Danny, if you're waiting to make a move, you're a bit late. Someone's already hit on me… a bit more of a man, if you ask me."

"So I've heard," the hybrid replied dryly. "Skulker's looking for more pelts to hang on his wall. One of them being mine."

She laughed, her ponytail swishing back and forth. Phantom was almost mesmerized by the female ghost. "I can see that happening. I'd want yours too after what…" She stopped talking, blinking. "Um, Phantom?"

He seemed to be floating slowly towards her. "Ember?"

She began to back away. "I already told you, you're too late! God, dipstick, quit hitting on me! I'm not in even in the range of your age!"

"It's not like that!" he told her fiercely, his eyes flashing angrily. "It's just… well…"

She waited.

"You've… got something in your… hair," he finished rather lamely, reaching out for the flame.

Ember smirked. "You're going to burn your hand there, ghost kid."

Phantom raised an eyebrow. "I think I'll manage."

He raised a hand to the spot on her head and began to wrap his fingers slowly around her neck. She looked at him. He was… actually, kind of cute. Not hot manly like, but sort of teenage cuteness. His hair was messy; his gaze was so lost and confusing. It was almost like he didn't know what he was doing. She cocked her head mockingly. "Are you going to attempt to kiss me, ghost boy?" she whispered, despite the moonlight shining down on them both.

He pulled his hand away, clutching what appeared to be a feather or something. "Your hair."

Ember snorted. "Yeah? What about it?"

"It shines in the moonlight, Ember. It's really pretty."

She laughed again. "My hair isn't pretty. It's almost…" She fumbled around for a moment. "…well, I guess it is shiny."

He grinned. "So."

"So what?"

"Aren't you going to… I dunno, attempt to kiss me?"

That stopped her cold in her tracks. She fumbled around for any word to say, but nothing could come to mind. She looked so lost, soured, petrified, elated… no one had ever asked that before. Not even her big lump of a ghost hunter boyfriend who couldn't catch this kid for beans. She blushed slightly. "Um, no. I wasn't going to try and do that."

"Oh." He sounded disappointed. "I was just… well, um…"

Her jaw dropped. "You really want to kiss me, dipstick?"

His lips suddenly smashed up against hers. Her eyes widened as she stared at the hybrid's closed eyes, hardly daring to believe this. The ghost kid was_ kissing_ her? What the heck was this?! Since when did he become so impulsive?! He always went for the Manson girl. That was the woman he loved, not her! Something else was bothering her, too.

Why was she almost enjoying this as much as he appeared to be?

She pulled away slowly, gazing at him in a very un-Emberlike manner. "What the hell was that?"

Phantom shrugged. "I wanted to know what going to the moon felt like for a little bit."

She crossed her arms. "Huh. That's funny. Because I felt nothing but your rank breath and my lips squished up against your own."

"Love isn't easy, Ember," he told her. "And neither are you."

"Because I already _HAVE_ a boyfriend!" she yelled at him. "How many times does that have to be yelled through that thick skull of yours?"

Phantom pulled out a thermos. Her eyes widened with fear and she grabbed her guitar.

He put it back away into his outfit and grinned. She narrowed her eyes. "What kind of trick are you playing on me now?"

Phantom looked back up at the moon and back at Ember McLain, famous rock star ghost. "Well, some ghosts have the need for fresh air, don't they?" he asked. "I figure this can be your one free night."

Her jaw dropped. "What?"

"Hurry up," he told her, putting his hand behind his back. "Before I change my mind."

Ember nodded. "I'll see you around, dipstick," she told him before flying off to the stadium.

Phantom smiled. "You too, Ember. You, too…"

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**Oh, my god. A DannyEmber piece. This is for the DannyEmber person in some of us. –coughInvaderJohnnycough- Reviews are enjoyed. Thanks for reading. **


	9. Dusk

**Finally, I have some ideas going here. They may be small, but I couldn't give a care. Don't know if I mentioned this before, but you all can snag these one-shots. Just credit a small idea portion. Don't care what they are. **

**Challenge by** Thunderstorm101

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9. Dusk 

_She thought he could be considered part of the dusk… _

He sat on the rooftop of the Fenton Works building, staring out into the sunset and wondering what would become of his future. Besides, he had just saved the world a couple of days ago, and the press was trying to get in on every nook and cranny of his lifestyle. The rooftops at night seemed to be the only way he could get away from those predator newscasters. He needed time to himself sometimes, and right now was the only way to be away from everyone.

Except for perhaps the figure flying to him on a jet board, clad in red and giving the teenage hybrid a smile of the ages. It wasn't a love smile… just a friendly grin to her former enemy. Danny Phantom stood up and nodded as she jumped off the board and onto the rooftop, taking off her helmet. "Hey there."

He smiled. "Valerie Gray. Haven't seen you in a while."

She smirked, sitting on the edge of the building, her feet now dangling over. "Times have changed, Phantom. Life goes on. Although I can't say that I'm still surprised you're Danny Fenton."

Phantom shrugged. "I guess I could say the same if I was in your shoes, Val. But then again, I'm not." He sighed and watched the sun begin to drift behind the clouds. "There's something else."

She waved it off. "I know, I know. You're in love with Sam Manson."

His jaw dropped, not bothering to cover his emotions. "Wait. You know?!"

Valerie laughed. "Look, Danny. Everyone has been watching you since the day the disasteroid nearly hit, and we've all seen your spur of affection for Sam. Trust me, I'm upset, but not in the way you'd think of it."

Phantom looked confused.

"Why didn't you tell me? If I'd known that you were a hybrid trying to save the city from ghosts and ruined my life in the lab, I might've gone a hair bit easier on you and not tried to kill you as much!" Her grin faded and her look turned serious. "Still, though, I can't believe it was you who ruined my life."

He shoved his fingers through his hair exasperatedly. "Oh, come on! How many times have I said I was sorry?!"

The huntress raised an eyebrow. "Hopefully, more than I can count."

Silence hung in the air after a while, the two of them now looking at the pink and red skyline where the sun once stood. Hybrid and hunter made no sound as they contemplated their own thoughts, seemingly eclipsed in the silent of the night. Finally, he spoke. "Have I ever told you about my ultimate enemy?"

Valerie shook her head. "Let me guess. Vlad Masters or Vlad Plasmius."

He shuddered at this. "If he was my enemy like the guy I'm thinking of, I would already be dead by now. Actually, he's a full blown ghost. There's no humanity in him whatsoever. And when I say no humanity, I mean _none_."

She blinked. "Do I know this ghost?"

Phantom now shook his head. "No. At least, not in this time stream you don't. You know him in a completely different time. His name is Dan Phantom, and he's responsible for how the world is in a completely different sense. It's a really long story."

Valerie smirked, turning off her phone. "I've got plenty of time."

_…Forty-five minutes later… _

"…and as far as I'm concerned, he could escape from that thermos of his one day and kill me," he finished, shaking his head.

Valerie's gaze was now at the building across the street, biting her lip. Phantom's ultimate enemy was himself as a pure ghost? All because of dear old "Uncle" Vlad Masters. He was a monster in her eyes. How could he put the teen through that much trouble and insanity? What was he? She let out a long sigh. "What was it you called him again?"

He snorted. "One seriously crazed-up fruit loop. Given the fact that…"

"Enough about him," she cut off, standing up. "So Dan's the evil you ten years from now if you cheat on an exam, huh?"

Phantom shrugged. "I guess."

Valerie crossed her arms and shivered, a cool breeze now blowing. "He's like the dusk."

The teenager looked at her, mystified. "What do you mean by that?"

"Well, think about it. In a sense, Dan is the epiphany of the evil inside of you. You said he wants to kill you, right? Well, if he did, he could kind of become whole. Despite the fact he has no amount of humanity in himself, technically he has it outside of himself. I mean, look at you. You're half a human, half a ghost- part of Dan. In order for the dusk to finally become nighttime, he needs to destroy his past self from another dimension. The dusk inside of Dan is raging to become full."

Phantom furrowed his brow. "I'm so lost, Val."

"He has to kill you to _truly_ destroy his human self. Technically, he's a heartless and sadistic soul in his time frame. But here, he still has you- his half human self. So the dusk is inside of him of being a human is in this time stream, but not in the one where he exists and you and he are mortal enemies."

Phantom frowned. "Not really, though. He's pure evil, no matter what."

Valerie nodded. "If it's what you think." Her jet board appeared, and she jumped on, firing up the rockets and smiling at the hybrid, slipping on her helmet. "It's getting late. I've got to be going."

He nodded as well. "Me too. I'll see you later?"

"Yep. See you around, ghost boy… I mean, Danny."

With one last wave, the Huntress flew off into the once-dusk sky towards her home, Phantom smiling and wondering how confusing life could get after an explanation like that.

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**Okay, people. I even confused _myself _with this one. Did ANYONE understand it at all? Feel free to ramble in those reviews. Thanks for reading! **


	10. Light

**Some ideas are better left unsaid… especially when they involve two people I don't ever write about. **

**One shot by choice.**

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10. Light

_Only in first grade, and the two had already blown a fuse… _

"Aw, come on, Kwan!" a blonde haired boy complained, pulling his football jersey friend into the classroom with him. "Everyone's at recess!"

The Asian child in Ms. Muzikima's first grade class looked at the unknown football star. "I don't know, Dash. Something feels really weird about this. Like we shouldn't be here."

Dash Baxter was not one for kids who weren't willing to take risks, and he was seriously beginning to doubt his new friend in class. So far, the only familiar faces Dash had seen was that Fenton kid whose parents fought ghosts, Sam Manson who was playing in the sandbox, and Tucker Foley. Tucker was a completely different story all together. "You're not going to turn into those other kids, are you?" he asked, a pleading tone evident in his voice.

Kwan Shozuma shook his head. "No."

"Good." Dash looked inside the classroom and grinned. "The teacher's not in here! C'mon, Kwan! Now's our chance!"

Kwan looked bewildered, his face bulging into a strange expression. "I don't get it, Dash. What are we doing?"

The blonde looked at the black-haired child in defeat. "Remember how Teacher said we were going to learn about light today? Why wait for those guys when I can show you how light work?!" His eyes shone with excitement as he shut the door, pulling in the other kid. "It's easy! Dad showed me how at home!"

For Kwan, he thought of Dash as his best friend since he had come from Japan when he was a child. The American had taught him a great deal about how people lived here in the United States, and he was ready for another lesson from the wise and popular Dash Baxter, who already had quite a number of women flocking at his heels.

Basically, they all asked him if he had cooties. And when he said no, they giggled and ran away. So much for being cute and having the looks.

Dash motioned to the boy and showed him the light switch to the classroom. "See this? It's a light switch. This is what makes the light go on and off!"

Kwan's face soured over momentarily. "I can do that easy."

The soon-to-be football jock crossed his arms and looked at him. "Oh, yeah? I bet I can do it more times than you!"

His friend grinned and put his hand on the switch. A moment later, the classroom was engulfed in darkness and silence hung in the air like a stunned individual had just seen a ghost. "It's scary in here," Dash whispered.

Kwan flipped the light back on. "See? I do know about light!"

"No fair!" his friend cried. "I wanna use the light!" He ran over and turned off the light switch. Once again, there was darkness in the room, but seconds later, Dash flipped it back on. Kwan proceeded to run to the other side of the room an grinned. Dash narroed his eyes. "Don't do it!"

_Flick._

Darkness.

_Flick. _

Dash turned the lights back on. Kwan scowled. "But I like the dark!"

_Flick. _

"Light!" Dash yelled.

_Flick. _

"Dark!" Kwan howled angrily.

_Flick. _

_Flick. _

_Flick. _

_ZAP! _

Dash flipped the switch on. Nothing happened. He tried again. Still nothing. He furiously flipped the light switch on and off in the classroom. Kwan's voice caused him to jump. "No more light, Dash."

He glared at the boy in the dark from what he could see. "This is all your fault."

Silence followed this, and moments later, a voice was heard from outside the door. Kwan looked terrified. "Oh, no! Teacher's coming back!"

Dash froze. "Uh-oh."

The door opened, and the light came in from the outside as their teacher, Ms. Muzikima, looked inside and flicked the light switch. Nothing happened. Frowning, she tried again, and nothing happened. Looking around, she stepped in and furrowed her brow. "Blown fuse?" she wondered aloud, her eyes darting around. There was a slight movement in the darkness, and Dash Baxter bolted out of the classroom, running down the hallway. She narrowed her eyes. "What is he doing in there?"

"He messed around with the light!" a familiar voice yelled out, footsteps now heard running past her. "I saw him!"

Muzikima glanced at Kwan in surprise. "Excuse me? Kwan, what were you doing in there with him?"

His face was tearful. "I was trying to stop him!"

The teacher nodded. "I understand. However, you should have come and got me first. I would have been able to stop him."

"Can I go wash my hands?"

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

"We're in trouble," Dash told Kwan as he sat in the next bathroom stall over.

Kwan sulked. "You should have never told me about how to work light, Dash."

"But we're still best friends, right?"

Dash nodded, despite the fact the other boy couldn't see him. "Uh-huh. You got it!"

"I still like the darkness."

Moments later, there were reports of a fuse being blown in the bathroom near the first grade hallway, and a mechanic went by to check out what had happened. Reports later indicated that two boys were arguing when he got there about how to turn the lights on and _leave_ them on. And yet, it wasn't half as fun. Besides, when did you last try and blow a fuse flicking a light switch on and off?

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**Wow. I'm scared. Where did I come up with this one? I like rambling again. Thanks for reading! **


	11. Loss

**God, I've been horrible with these updates, given I have no flipping COMPUTER! Ah… okay, then. I must thank you all for the wonderful ideas that you have decided to give me with this one shot challenge, as I am fervently working on plot specks and whatnot. So, I'll give you another Vlad one shot challenge. **

**Spoilers include: _Masters of All Time alternate ending. _**

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**Challenge by **Annab3ll3 L33

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11. Loss 

_It really was a double edged sword. _

He gritted his teeth in despair, mind working furiously. What could it have been? Never before had he felt so useless. If only he had the ingredients for the portal and that cat-needing bachelor's ecto-acne problem. A hand was on his shoulder, and he looked up. The master of time gave him a sad sort of smile. "I'm sorry, Danny," he whispered. "It was meant to be this way."

The hybrid shrugged the hand away, angry tears clouding his vision. "Why?! If I could have figured out what had been changed in the whole thing…" This wasn't fair! Why couldn't he figure it out? It was almost as if something was clouding his vision. Danny Phantom glanced at Clockwork again. "Can't I do something?"

"Loss is a part of life. In your case, it is a double edged sword. You lose your two best friends who know and share almost everything with you, but you also lose your mortal enemy." He pointed his staff to the trio lying in beds under quarantine. "Go. Be with them."

Phantom didn't have to be told twice.

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

Danny sat by Sam and Tucker's bedsides, looking at both of them with sad, blue eyes. They both looked sick to their stomachs, especially Tucker, whose continual moaning had almost the entire Fenton clan surrounding him. Maddie took a thermometer from his mouth and looked down at it. "103.4 degrees and climbing," she mumbled worriedly.

Jack took the one from Vlad's mouth. "We'd better keep going," he told his 'pal', rubbing his chest. "You're at 106.2. C'mon, V-man. Don't fail me now!"

Danny growled softly enough for only Sam, Jazz, and Tucker to hear him. "That fruit loop is so dead if he makes it out of this alive."

Sam smiled weakly. "Save it, Danny."

Tucker squeezed his gloved hand. He could hardly make any sounds now; his throat had felt as if it had swollen to the size of a watermelon. He wanted so badly to speak to his best friend. The harder he tried, the worse he felt. So itchy, so painful… a thought suddenly occurred to him. Maybe he looked like a balloon. He closed his eyes. Sleep. Glorious sleep. Oh, that would be so nice right about now. Nothing more…

He let go of Danny's hand. It limply fell to the side of the bed. His heart monitor flat lined.

Danny stared at his best friend, tears of anger and stunned realization coming to his eyes. "Oh, my god. No. No way. Tucker?"

Sam's eyes shone with what little tears she could muster. "Oh, god. Tucker…" She squeezed Danny's hand. "Danny…"

He took a deep, shuddering breath. "I wasn't strong enough to save him, Sam. Why?"

Jazz looked over at the duo next to each other and Danny's friend. She swallowed and watched him with horror. "Tucker?" She walked over to his bedside, tears beginning to slightly fall. "Oh, no…"

Danny shot Vlad a venomous look. Sam's hand began to slightly slip from his hand. He turned back to her, a small smile escaping from her lips. "We'll… we'll come back, Danny," she whispered, forcing herself to hold onto his hand. Her breathing began to slow down slightly. "As… as ghosts. I prom… promi…" Her eyes closed, the red blotches on her face slightly inflating. Her hand slipped from Danny's grasp and hit the side of the bed.

He shook his head in sadness, disbelief, anger. No. She couldn't have been dead. Tucker and Sam, gone from his inept abilities to figure out the cure. Maddie walked over to Danny, wrapping her arms around him lovingly. It was all he could take from breaking down and sobbing like a five year old child. Jazz's quiet sobs wracked the background as she rocked her son back and forth. "Danny, I understand how hard this may be for you, but…"

He pushed away. "No. No, Mom. You don't understand. Just… please just leave me alone for a little while."

She just nodded before walking over to Jack, who was still hitting Vlad on the chest. She put her hand on his shoulder and nodded sadly. "Jack, let's go."

He nodded simply, shaking his head in disbelief. Maddie gripped him and practically dragged the man from the room as he tried to stay by Vlad's side. It was almost a heart-wrenching moment from Danny; had he not had so much hate for Vlad, he would have almost insisted that Jack stay with his friend.

The two ghost hunters finally left the room as Danny slowly walked over to Vlad's bed. The male's hand tried to grip Danny's arm, but he instead found his hand. His eyes burned emerald as he tried to wrench away from him. "You've ruined everything," he hissed angrily, foaming at the mouth. _"Everything!" _

Vlad opened one eye and grinned, griping the edge of the bed now. Triumphant ice-blue eyes bore into his foe's now sky-blue ones. "True," he whispered, trying to get one last gasp of air. "But now your mortal enemy would soon be dead, Daniel, won't he?"

With this, his chest stopped lifting as his arms slipped off the sheets to which he held. Danny stood there for a moment, and he finally turned back to his two friend's dead bodies. The tears were flowing much more freely now. Clockwork was right- he had always been right. Loss truly was a double-edged sword. He lost one thing, but he gained another. Right?

It was true. He would wait for the day he would someday meet Vlad Masters once again. And when that day came, Vlad had better be ready- he was going to seriously die a painful death.

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**Aaaaaaaah! Stupid Plasmius. Some ending… well, I hope you liked it. Reviews are feeding my muse. Wait for the next chapter, and thanks for reading! **


	12. Weltschmerzen

**-groans- I haven't one-shoted with this in a while. (Is that even a word?) Nonetheless, I'm still here with my challenge ideas in front of me, and I'm on break now. I see updates with this one. I'm aiming for 100 reviews in this when 2008 rolls around. –looks sheepish- Hard goal, but we can do it. **

**Challenge by** Hordak's Pupil

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12. Weltschmerzen 

_Translated in German, it means "world weariness." _

She loved her brother. Jazz Fenton didn't know of someone else for whom she cared for more. Danny Fenton was just a spark of hope for her- the one thing she could always count on for help in ghostly situations or when he needed someone to talk to. She admired his ghostly side, Phantom, with everything she had. Times had changed since she had found out about their identity as one being. And as she watched him walk into her room, she couldn't help but notice that something was definitely on his mind. What it was, she couldn't tell.

Her brother sat on her bed, sighing, and pushing back his raven hair. "I'm done. I'm finished."

Confused, she looked up from her homework and eyed her brother curiously. "What do you mean?"

"You ever get that feeling that no one ever appreciates your work and you're tired of the fact that the world always needs saving?"

Jazz looked pensive at this. "Actually, no. But given you're a half ghost hero and I'm the lonely sister…"

Danny laughed slightly. "True. But still, did you ever wonder what it was like to… you know, not be a superhero?"

"Where's this going, Danny?"

He out his head in his hands and groaned. "I'm so sick and tired of going out every night and fighting ghosts! Isn't there a day where I don't have to go out and fight something? Just once, I'd really like to remember what it's like being a regular kid with no archenemies, no knowledge about ghosts, and all this other stuff I've been going through!"

She smiled slightly. "Ah, okay. I understand what you mean. _Weltschmerzen." _

The hybrid blinked. "Espa-whaza-whoma?"

"_Weltschmerzen_," she replied again, snapping her book shut and brushing back a strand of her hair. "I learned it from a friend of mine. It means 'world weariness' in German. You're beginning to feel as if you shouldn't be saving the world all the time. The world is weary of being in trouble. Are you beginning to feel the stress of the world on your shoulders, Danny?"

He stared at her. "You think?"

Jazz smiled. "What's the real problem with it?"

Danny nodded. "Same thing every day. The city needs me, the world needs me. Isn't there one day where there wasn't something that had to deal with violence, ghosts, or the mayor? Look at you, Jazz- you're in the perfect position. A normal person… no ghost powers, no fear of being attacked because I'm always there…"

"But I _worry_ about you!" she burst out, tears filling her eyes slightly. "I'm not referring the word to only you. It applies to the whole planet. 'World weariness,' Danny, not self-weariness. Think about it- everyone's tired of something. I'm tired of doing my homework right now, Mom and Dad is tired of not catching you, Vlad's tired of you not wanting to be his son…" She took a deep breath. "Weariness is a complex thing, Danny. Trust me."

He rolled his eyes. "Typical. A psychology lecture from you about the science of one word."

Jazz bit the inside of her mouth. "It's not about the meaning, it's about the principle!"

"Right."

"You feel it all the time!"

Danny glared at her. "Thanks for noticing for the something-th time, Doctor Fenton. I feel so much better now. Makes you wonder how other people are feeling now, too, huh?"

"You can be such a pain sometimes!" Jazz declared hotly, picking up her book again.

Her brother shrugged, as if saying "no duh."

Fuming, the girl flipped to a page in her textbook and stared at the page for a long minute. She snapped it shut again in exasperation, watching her brother sit on the bed and stare at the floor. "Look, if you want something to think about, how about reliving those moments in time when you wanted to take the world off your shoulders? Being a hero is one of the biggest jobs you can ever have, Danny."

"And hardest," he agreed reluctantly. "Sometimes I wonder if I'm not cut out for this sort of thing, you know? Look at me. The world's only true half human, half ghost hero, and he's complaining on how he doesn't want to save the world anymore. There's gotta be something up with that, Jazz. Or am I just having a spasm?"

Jazz smiled slightly at this. "Well, I don't know. I would call it more along the lines of a rant."

Danny's face cracked a little into a grin.

"Stop beating yourself up, little brother," she told him. "You're my hero, and I can't have you simply stop saving the world. Our world… our world of weariness. _Weltschmerzen." _

He stood up and walked over to Jazz. For a moment, she thought she saw the wild-eyed look of a sixteen year old with emerald green eyes and snowy white hair staring into her lavender ones. The image was gone, though, when he embraced her tightly. "Thanks. I needed that."

Jazz nodded. "Anything for you, Danny. Anything for you."

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**Bonding, bonding, and more bonding. This is really the first time I've tried doing a Jazz and Danny centric piece with them. What did you all think? Let's go for the goal of 100 by 2008! And challenge me, friends! Thanks for reading and maybe reviewing! **


	13. Devastation

**I know for a fact that I am going to get a very random rant from all of you at the end of this one-shot. At least, I hope I do. It was great fun to write! **

**EDIT: Several typos were spotted in here. I fixed them. Now your eyes won't bleed.**

**Challenge by** Plushiemon

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13. Devastation

_This was why he hated the Box Ghost. _

It was an utter mess- food trays strewn everywhere, food plastered on the walls, drink spilled everywhere. It was like sanity had been completely lost, and no one was there to help clean up its mess. Heck, the boxes that were random distributed through the scene meant mass chaos in the first place. Not a happy place to be, but prison sure could get interesting sometimes.

Walker wanted to strange the Box Ghost.

He stared at the room, seemingly calm on the outside, but inwardly, he was a bomb ready to blow within a minute's time. Clenching his fists, he muttered to himself, "When I get my hands on that no good spectral excuse for a ghost…"

"BEWARE!"

This was why he hated the Box Ghost. Randomly shooting up at every chance he had and hollering at the top of his lungs that insane word was enough to drive anyone up a wall. Especially Walker, who whirled around and stared at the cardboard-wielding figure in front of him. "_You,_" he whispered icily. "You've completely ruined this entire cafeteria for a piece of cardboard, started a food fight, and are back at the scene of the crime, is it? All for this_ one stupid piece of cardboard!"_ Walker picked up a box and shook it in front of the Box Ghost's face. "It's _chaos_ in here!"

"I, the Box Ghost, have only returned for my square shaped cardboard and wish to leave you in peace!" the overalled man bellowed in his ears. "I have not caused you, or your jail, any of this devastation!"

Walker was really tempted to smack the ghost upside the head with the cardboard. "How could you not cause these strewn boxes all over the place?!" he growled, gesturing to the room. "I only know of one ghost that's obsessive over square boards, and that's you, punk!"

The Box Ghost shrugged. "You expect me to know about this food fight?"

"_YES!"_ the sheriff finally exploded, pointing his finger and the specter. "I expect you to know that you pulled off this stunt to grab your boxes and race out the door, but I showed up just when you were about to get them! I have _fugitives_ in these holding cells, punk! You're going to become on of them!"

Someone should have laughed to diffuse the situation. No one stepped up to take that honor.

One of the ghostly janitors began to quietly pick up the mess in the room while watching Walker and the Box Ghost in their shouting match. He'd been working there for three eternities, if that was even possible, and he had yet to not see a spat between these two for a couple of months. It was always the same- there'd be mass chaos in the lunch room, Walker would make a big scene, and he'd end up being the one that would clean up the messes. The janitor hated this job, but it had its perks.

Like this classic conversation.

Walker's veins were popping out. "You started this mess; you're going to finish it!"

Clearly, the Box Ghost was in no mood to argue with the sheriff. "I, the Box Ghost, only want my square cardboard of doom, and I will leave you in peace!"

"That does it!" Walker thrust an ecto-beam at the annoying ghost, who dodged out of the way and raised his hands. Boxes flew up from the corner and went in Walker's direction. "Enough of you! Take you stupid boxes and get out of here, criminal!"

The Box Ghost grinned. "BEWARE!"

With that, he disappeared through the walls, leaving a fuming sheriff in his wake. The janitor walked over, pushing his mop and bucket with him. "Sir?"

"_WHAT?!" _he screamed.

The ghost made no change in his stance. "If I might be so kind as to venture a guess at who could have started this?"

Walker forced himself to stay calm. "I told you, Evan- it was the Box Ghost!"

"Really?" he asked mildly, despite his boss's furious aura. "From what I last remember, he was busy gathering boxes for you so you could 'wrap' the Christmas gifts for the inmates. Then he was going to pick up the left-over boxes from a few days ago, and then that shouting match began. Or are you going through one of your short-term memory lapses?"

Walker seethed. If he hatred something more than the Box Ghost, it was the mention of his memory.

He stared at Evan, who held the mop. "The devastation in this room must be clean at once for that Christmas party tonight. If it isn't done in less than three hours, you're out of a job!"

"Sir…"

Walker glared at the ghost. He knew that look of murder. Silently, he continued finish cleaning the floor, thanking the Box Ghost that he had taken the cardboard from the room. It made his life easier and the Box Ghost's life much more enjoyable. But he didn't say that aloud. That would involve probably a night in a cell.

The sheriff floated out of the room and stared at his prison from the outside. His territory, his place to take charge and keep his grip over the ghost zone.

He would wait for the day when he had to take Danny Phantom by the neck and thrust him into a jail cell. That punk was going to get it… but less than the Box Ghost. That phantom was definitely in for some pain.

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**Wow. I have no idea if I did this okay or not. Hopefully so. Thanks for reading, and merry Christmas**


	14. Guilt

**As the scary person I am, and in honor of the last day of the year, I will give you a final one-shot for this year, 2007! Not surprisingly, it is angst. Why wouldn't it be angst? It's what I'm getting known for around here. Anyways, this is another Danny-and-Vlad fic. That really shouldn't surprise you, either. **

**WARNINGS: Angst, dark, slight language **

**Challenge by **LookingGlass

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14. Guilt 

_What was this feeling that rose from within him? _

"Aaaaaaaaaaah!" the teenage wonder screamed as he felt flying back and skidded into the dirt. His hazmat mat was nearly torn to shreds, his gloves had holes in it, and his once pure-white boots had mud and green blood inked onto them. He lay in the grass, blood in his mouth and tears of anger in his emerald green eyes. Danny Phantom couldn't take this anymore. He hated this battle, his foe, everything about the surroundings.

He hated Vlad Plasmius more than anything.

He tried to stand up, but right as he began to go upright, his knees gave way, sending him back to the ground. Fingers dug into the dirt as a laugh rang in his ears- one so familiar, yet not familiar to him at all. Phantom could distinguish Plasmius' cackle from anywhere, but it had an edge to it. His eyes landed on the black boots walking in his direction. His mind began to interpret a voice. "I'll ask you once again, Daniel," it purred between clenched teeth. "_Had enough?_"

"No," he replied evenly, forcing himself not to cry. "You'll never get what you want."

The boot landed into the flesh of Phantom's stomach as he cried out in pain. No longer on his hands and knees, the half ghost lay flat on his back, watering eyes staring into his foe's blood red ones. A gloved hand reached out and grabbed him by the neck, thrusting him into a tree. It moved gently to the trachea, blocking his air supply slightly. Plasmius licked his lips slightly. Phantom shook his head, choking. "What? Are you going to kill me, Plasmius?"

Plasmius' eyes flashed dangerously. The teen knew that one false move would end his life. "Let me ask you this, Daniel. Who do you fear more: Death… or me?"

He moved his hand down. Phantom took a gasp of the sweet oxygen. He was still alive, but only by a thread, and Plasmius wanted him to answer this question? "Why?"

"I asked you because I want to know," the bachelor growled, tightening his throat and his fist. "Answer me!"

The teen glared into the eyes of hate. "You."

He closed his eyes, waiting for the fist to come and connect with his head for the final blow. It was the end. "I fear you more than Death, Vlad. Death comes by and takes life because he has a reason. You take people's lives for no reason at all!"

Phantom braced himself. Here it comes.

But no fist came. He opened his eyes and was shocked to see Plasmius blinking in shock.

He was worse than Death itself? How was this even possible? And what was this feeling that was welling up inside of him? He felt… upset. Angry. Sad.

But most of all… he felt guilty.

Was he a fool for making such a big deal out of all of this? Was he a fool for wanting to kill Jack, to marry the love of his life? Was he foolish in his activities of life, of trying and risking everything for Daniel to be his son? He tried to push it all back down, but suddenly it burst forth like a dam, flooding him with it. Guilt, for all the years of hating his only true friend. Guilt, for Daniel hating him. Guilt, for trying to kill the boy.

He hated this feeling, but at the same time, he embraced it. What people called a guilty feeling… he wanted to suddenly wallow in it.

He let Phantom go by the neck, his fist uncurling and his feet forcing him to step back. He shook his head. "Not today, my boy."

Phantom stared up at Plasmius. "What?"

"Worse than… worse than _Death?_" he asked, almost to himself. His eyes stared back at the blank green ones. "You called me worse than Death…"

"Damn right I did!" the teen replied fiercely, and Plasmius almost smiled at the note of defiance in his voice. "You never care about anything but yourself! Never recognized that when you first began to fight me, huh?"

He continued to gaze into Phantom's troubled look. "Would you rather Death came by and took your life instead of me, Daniel? Would it make your life easier?"

Phantom weakly tried to punch his foe, but Plasmius grabbed his hand and pushed his face into his young archenemy's. "Do you know what I'm feeling, Daniel?"

He shook his head fervently.

"I'm feeling… guilty."

The hybrid blanched at this. "What?"

"You've made me feel guilty, my boy," the billionaire admitted, releasing his hand. "You've made me guilt for what I've done in the past. I don't know what the hell you did, but it sure made me change my mind about killing you today."

Phantom backed away into the tree. "You're… you're _bipolar._"

Plasmius allowed a low growl in his throat, a shadow of his sadistic self. "Watch it, dear boy.

"I'm letting you go, but only today. You're lucky you've managed to make me feel worse than I already do. I suggest you get out of my sight before I do something worse than death."

Phantom shook his head and turned invisible. With what remaining energy he had left, he flew home as fast as he could.

Plasmius stood by that tree for a long time, staring at the ectoplasmic blood pool made by his foe. The guilt washed over him as he landed his fist into the tree. Damnit! He was so close to destroying his one shot to love, but Daniel had to take it away with guilt. His hand shook as he stared at his reflection in the pool.

The guilt… it was so overpowering as he finally tore his eyes away from the green blood and flew towards the capital building. He shook himself out of his self-pity, but the fact remained that Vlad Plasmius had felt guilt for the first time in his life.

And for some reason, he was wishing that Daniel could help him reach that point again. The point of caring, but not loving. The point of guilt and regret for what he nearly did.

But he never cared about anything.

Right?

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**Somehow, I'm very pleased with how this came out, except for the end. I thought the ending kind of, well, stunk. This one is Teen for a reason. Major angst, almost tragic, three words of language… exactly. Thanks for reading, and please review! **


	15. Shakes

**Wow. I'm already up to Chapter 15 on this thing, and quite a few of you have managed to stick with me for all of the chapters! I've got some dedicational one-shots to do for you all. But first, a nice rundown of thanks to those who cared to review. They include… **

Plushiemon, Silver Shadowbreeze, Starhunter, Forgive and Forget, Fernclaw, Devianta, Hordak's Pupil, JH24, EmoGwynddoniaeth2, Thunderstorm101, tsubasahope, MutantLover09, OMFG-Roach, Dante Inferno, sciencefreak330, Adrian Winter, LookingGlass, Invader Johnny, PunkMichPhantom, General Blackout, effegee, pearl84

**One-shot by choice. Dedication to **Devianta** for reviewing almost every single chapter!**

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15. Shakes 

_A date, one shake… love was in the air. _

He brought the shake over to the table, setting it down in the middle and smiling widely. He had waited a long time for today. He felt tingly inside, scared, happy… too many feelings to count at one time. It was chocolate, her favorite. He wanted to make an impression that could last a lifetime, and everybody knew that it was first dates that were most important in a relationship.

Jack Fenton squeezed into the booth right across from Madeline Jules, who smiled and began to take out the straw. "Looks like that little game over at Baxter's party seemed to do wonders, Jack," she laughed, sticking the straw in. "I can't remember the last time someone remembered that my favorite flavor for anything was chocolate."

Jack stuck in his own straw, taking a sip. "Well, I am one for chocolate…"

"…and fudge," she finished.

He laughed. "So what did you think of that symposium about ghosts, Maddie?"

She brushed a hair out of her face. Jack stared at her dreamily. She had the most gorgeous hair. It was so strawberry blonde. Her eyes sparkled like diamonds in the sunlight as she spoke with a sort of passion in her tone. "I thought it was quite nice," she told him, taking a sip herself. "Although I must say, trying to build a ghost portal could be a lot of dangerous work. I wonder how long it took them to build it."

Jack took out a pamphlet and flipped through it. "It says in here that it took a year and a half to build," he read. He glanced up, eyes shining. "You know, Maddie… if we built a portal smaller than that, it could take us a quarter of the time! With your brains, Vlad's building skills, and my provision of snacks, we can get that baby done in no time at all!"

"But, Jack, that could take four months," the female scientist objected, taking another sip of the chocolate shake. "By then, we might lose interest in it!"

Jack frowned. "Don't damper the prospect of science, Maddie! We can do it!"

She smiled, putting her hand on top of his. "And that's what I love about you, Jack. You're always so optimistic, humorous… I think that's why I'm drawn to you more than Vlad."

He blinked. _This_ was unexpected.

Maddie looked down. "I shouldn't have said that."

There was silence for around three minutes before Jack finally went digging into his pocket and pulled out a small container. He opened it up and smiled. "Fenton fudge?"

Maddie laughed. "Why not?" She took a piece out of the box and ate it, her face lighting up like a Christmas tree. "Wow! Did you make this yourself?"

"It's my mother's recipe," Jack admitted, taking out two pieces and eating them, followed by a sip of chocolate shake. "She sent it to me from home."

The duo both leaned in for another sip of the shake. For a moment, their eyes interlocked. Maddie couldn't pull herself away from Jack's sky blue eyes. They were so longing for her, so wanting, and yet… and yet they seemed so willing to give her what she wanted most: love. Pure unadulterated love.

"So, when do you want to start?"

She blinked out of her gaze and looked at the older male, confused. "Start?"

"Building the portal!" he replied excitedly. "I'm sure we can get it done by Thanksgiving if we begin working on it tomorrow!"

Maddie took out her notes from the symposium and looked at them carefully. "Well, first we're going to have to work on your math," she joked, jabbing the paper with her index fingers. "These calculations that you gave to Professor Caine _still_ aren't right." She glanced at it. "I wonder if he was half asleep when he checked your homework…"

Jack snorted. "He's always asleep when he checks our papers, Maddie."

"True," she admitted. She watched Jack finish the shake. "Kind of how I met you in the first place."

The older man shrugged. "First a math tutor, now my girlfriend. What more can be said?"

She sighed. "I'll check over them tonight. In the meantime, you can go ask Vlad if he wants to give us his help in this project."

"You make it sound like it's a bad thing," Jack observed.

Maddie scoffed. "Have you seen the way he flirts with me? Sometimes, I wonder if he's in his right mind. I don't know, Jack. I just hope he stops by the time our wedding rolls around."

The burly man waved it aside. He knew his best friend was a good man and get over his infatuation soon enough. Besides, Jack had already asked Maddie to be his girlfriend. Surely Vlad had realized this. Not that he had noticed the resentful glares he shot at the male when he had his arms wrapped around the woman he loved. Then again, Jack was almost that oblivious to his unpopular ways with other students.

That would be better left unsaid.

Maddie slid out from the booth and stood up, kissing Jack on the cheek. "Well, I'd better get going."

"I'll drive," Jack offered, jingling his car keys.

She smiled. "Thanks for everything, Jack. I really had a fun time tonight. I'll look over this stuff when I get home, and you can tell Masters what's going on with this."

"That way, we can make sure nothing goes wrong!" Jack replied happily.

The woman nodded. "There's always a possibility, though."

"Please!" the Fenton man chided. "With you, me, and V-Man working this one together, what could possibly go wrong?!"

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**Um, everything? Wow. A date fan fictional one-shot. And it isn't even SamxDanny. Time to move out of the comfort zone, huh? Hey, please review. Sure, it's fluff, but I wanted to do this. Thanks for reading! **


	16. Donation

**Wha? –stares at screen- Over 100 reviews? How did _that_ happen? **

**Special thanks to **Hordak's Pupil** for submitting the 100th review.**

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16. Donation 

_"Give a donation; get a hug." _

The chatter and excitement outside of Vlad Masters' office seemed to be grating on one of his last nerves that day as he sat at his desk, petting Maddie with unusual force. It was summer in Amity Park, one of the more hated seasons of the mayor's year. It meant school was out, Daniel was about, and there were constant complaints about heat and air conditioning and repairs… and the noise outside of young people and adults only annoyed him further.

Groaning and getting up, Vlad grumbled under his breath, "Someone explain to me again why in the name of Brett Farve I became the mayor of this town… oh, wait. Now I remember. It's so I can make my archenemy's life miserable. In which it's a fifteen year old _teenager!"_ He stood up and glanced out his window, opening the curtain and seeing mass mobs of people line up on the lawn.

He looked backwards and frowned. "Candace, am I expected to give any speeches today?"

There was a rustling of papers before the voice of a young woman gently called back, "No, sir. In fact, you're not supposed to speak until sometime next month about the new water mainframe under the city."

Vlad narrowed his eyes. "Thank you, ma'am."

Something was wrong with this picture. _And_ he was getting a migraine.

It was rare when the mayor of Amity Park got headaches, much less migraines for that matter. He winced, digging into his drawer and pulling out a bottle of Tylenol. He popped two in his mouth, washed it down, and shook himself out of his daze. It was time to go and meet the public on the lawn and ask them why they were so eager to see him.

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

"Hugs! Get your hugs!" Danny Fenton hollered, watching the masses of the city line up in the hot sun. "Give a donation; get a hug from your favorite mayor in the city!"

In all seriousness, Danny had never been more bored in his life. These summer days were supposed to be spent at the mall, not in the sun and collecting money for a new computer. It had all been Tucker's idea for him to run the booth while he and Sam provided refreshments. He agreed, thinking it wouldn't be that hard to run a booth. Boy, was he wrong.

It was the worst job he could have ever done in his life. He gave a small sigh and called out once again to the people who dropped in their loose change and watched the door eagerly. "Give a donation; get a hug from your favorite mayor in the city!"

Tucker came out from around the corner and handed the teenager a glass of lemonade. "How're you doing here, dude?"

"Me? Crappy." Danny finished the drink in one gulp. "I can't believe I agreed to do this. Vlad's going to kill me."

His friend shrugged and looked in the glass jar. "Well, you're getting a lot of coins," he quipped.

The teen gave him a dark look.

A yell interrupted their conversation, much to Danny's relief. "Hey! When're we going to be able to see the mayor?!"

"Soon," he called back wearily, wiping his face with his shirt and turning towards the door. "You'll see him really soon!" He turned back to Tucker, who grinned sheepishly. "Where is that fruit loop?" he hissed through his teeth. "I thought he'd be out right now!"

Tucker winked. "Give him six more seconds."

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

He sighed and opened the doors to the outside world, where the entire town of Amity Park seemed to be scrunched onto the little piece of grass he called a yard. The walkways were filled with people, and a small booth of to the west side seemed only to gather more and more crowds. Vlad merely stare at the immense numbers on his lawn before finally marching over to the wooden booth to have a talk with the operator. Whoever was doing this was about to get a piece of his mind.

The person sitting in the lawn chair made him gasp, blood suddenly beginning to boil.

Danny Fenton.

Vlad growled lowly in his throat and tapped his shoulder. Yelping, Danny turned around and… "Oh. Hi, Vlad," he greeted moodily.

_"What in the blazes are you doing on my front lawn?!"_ he bellowed at the top of his lungs. "This is my property, Daniel! I could have you arrested for trespassing!"

Danny's blood also began to seethe. But a strange calmness seemed to rise as well. He didn't know whether to laugh or scream at the middle-aged bachelor right in front of him. So instead, he decided to roll the dice and place all his money on the table.

"Ladies and gentlemen! I bring you… _Mayor Masters!"_ he announced, pointing to the bewildered billionaire.

It happened at once.

The mob suddenly moved. People clamored over one another, shoving other people out of the way and yelling, "Give me my hug, sir! Please!" Various cried were taken up, and soon, Vlad found himself backing away- slowly at first, but he soon picked up his feet and ran. Girly screams of "Yoo-hoo! Vladdie!" were heard, and the large mob closed in on Vlad as he back up against the wall.

And it was chaos. People leaned in for hugs, giving coos of "Awww!" and black-slapped hugs of "You're the best mayor ever!" If Vlad didn't know any better, he could have sworn that Danny had this all planned out for some sort of evil summer prank.

Meanwhile, the teenage hero sighed and looked at Tucker. "People are going to want some serious footage of 'Donate Hugs to Vlad Day,'" he told his friend, handing him his camera. "Go snap some photos and make sure they have Vlad hugging someone."

Tucker grinned and snatched the camera, disappearing into the crowds.

And in the midst of the chatter, snapping of shutters, and now-laughing Danny Fenton, a scream of anguish was heard.

"DANIEL! YOU WILL RUE THE DAY YOU ASKED FOR THOSE DONATIONS!"

He had never been happier to hear a threat.

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**I got this inspiration from a friend of mine. She drew a chibi Vlad Plasmius for me that screamed out "I NEED NO ONE!", then a smaller one that's like "I want a hug…" and this came to me. Oh, the humanity… thanks for reading. **


	17. Investigate

**I think I better do another one-shot in here before I let this thing curl like linoleum... o.O**

**Done in first person POV. Semi-AU in respect that PP never happened.**

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17. Investigate

_It's what he did now. Nothing more, nothing less.._

People drop by my office every now and again, bringing me old missing persons reports and asking me to solve cases that all other people thought were unsolvable. In a sense, I'm like a last resort to people- definitely not someone you want to go and see first. Why? Beats me. I thought I charged a pretty darn good amount of money to do my work. Times are hard in Amity Park, and my workload has been overflowing on my desk- so much I have to clean it and reorganize my papers once a week. I'm a pretty clean person. It's just that those manila envelopes keep stacking and stacking on my desk.

I have one pile for murders, one pile for kidnappings, and still another one for missing people who _haven't_ been kidnapped. And Sam wonders how I manage to get all my papers mixed and mingled with each other on my desk. The piles are literally two feet high- I measured once when I was trying to solve the Foley/Gray case of their missing daughter. Turns out she went into the ghost zone for a bit for a school dare or something. Honestly, who does that sort of thing? I know I didn't in the day.

I'm a private investigator now, if you didn't notice. New cases come in every day, and I have to go through each of them one by one. I have to see what I recognize from the data they give me. I have to ask them questions that they don't want to answer. I have to go and chase ghosts sometimes to try and get the answers I want. Hell, sometimes I have to go back to my own family and ask them things about the past they want to stay buried.

Look, I don't know what happened to Amity Park over the years, but from what I saw, it deteriorated under Mayor Masters' rule. Ghosts came in more often. My high school life became more intense. College was looming over our heads like some sort of crazy ghost trying to escape from his thermos. And now I see the city for all it's worth. After so many grim realizations came into play...

My identity exposed by Vlad Masters himself... Sam moving out of the city... college...

God, it's really been hell.

But that's beyond the point right now.

Sam moved back to Amity Park around two years ago, and since then, we've started a private investigator business that has practically made us millionaires overnight. No one else seems to want to solve these wonderfully gruesome cases besides me and Sam. What I don't get is why Tucker won't join i on the whole thing. Probably because of the fact he's wanting to settle down with Valerie and his little girl.

I've been out of college for ten years now. Graduated in 2015 after getting my MD- Master's Degree.

Fun? Can't say it's been all fun and games tracking down criminals.

I'm not here to talk about my life story, though- even though I did give you a run-down of what's happened so far.

My latest customer just so happened to be my sister, Jazz. She's been off doing some psychology work and hasn't had any time to see me for the past few months. I just thought she came by to visit me for a moment before she went off to some asylum again to help other people in their own little world. urns out, she's got a case for me now, too. _My own sister_ has a manila envelope for me to study. Isn't that a nice way to greet your brother you haven't seen in months?

She put down the envelope and took off her coat, eyeing me warily, as if I was some sort of time bomb. "Sorry for bursting in on such short notice."

"What notice?" I tried to quip.

Jazz moved it in front of me and studied my reaction as I opened the folder and looked at the contents inside. Papers of his disappearance, newspaper clippings, DVDs of some of his more infamous speeches... I raised an eyebrow, gritting my teeth. She had to be kidding me. Jazz wanted me to look for _him?_ I looked up at my sister and put down the folder. "Why? What's so important about him?"

She looked flustered and winced at the slightly sharp edge in my voice. "Well, he's one of my patients, Danny. I have so man things of him ranting about you and his ghost powers and everything. He's still mad about everything that's happened over the years that you've been a half ghost. And he talks about that day that he exposed you to the city..."

"I don't want to hear about that day," I told her flatly. "It brings enough bad memories as it is. You really think you gotta put salt in the open wound?"

The woman looked distressed. "No one else will take this case. You're the only person left, Danny. You've gotta find him."

I ran my fingers through my raven hair. "At what cost, though, Jazz? I don't know what he's going to do if I find him. And if what you're saying is true, he's going to practically destroy me on the spot."

She looked really upset by all of this now, giving me awkward looks and glancing at the papers on my desk. It really did pain me to see her in this right state, and the last thing I wanted to do is turn down someone in need- especially my own sister. A sigh escaped my lips and and I pulled the file towards me. "I'll get on it as soon as I can. You can pay me when I get back to you about the result of the whole thing."

Jazz looked happier than when she was probably having one of her patients in a room with her. She stood up and grabbed her coat, giving me a warm smile. "I need to thank you for this. Really. How can I repay you?"

I shook my head. "I'll tell you later. Just... just get back to what you were doing before you dropped this off, all right?"

She nodded and walked out the door moments later. After hearing it shut, I leaned back in my chair and groaned.

The disappearance of Vlad Masters- no wonder no one else wanted to solve it. He had been gone for quite a number of years... give or take, probably four. And everyone was fine with it- until war for power broke out amongst the citizens.

It would be put away for another day. I had too many other murders and kidnapping to solve right now.

Was it a mistake to even take Vlad's case file in the first place?

* * *

**Okay, then... someone say weird. Anyways, school is done next week- June 5th. Eight more days. -sighs- Projects, papers, exams... need I say more?**


	18. Exhilaration

**Man, I must be PSYCHO to do this one. And to do it with a freakin' crossover... and to think: BLOOD AND VIOLENCE. Don't say I didn't warn you. PostPP and postMGS: Twin Snakes.**

**Scene: Battlefield. Bad things are happening. Amity is a war zone. Enough said.**

**Hah. I can't possibly want to own Metal Gear Solid, so back off with the lawyers.**

**Challenge by** purrbaby101

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18. Exhilaration

_Feel the rush... the rush of something you've always felt in battle._

"What's that supposed to mean?" he growled, loading his gun up and standing against the wall.

Phantom was ready to offer a rather well placed retort before more gunfire came across the way. He stayed against the wall and swore angrily under his breath, watching the soldiers on their side topple like trees in the wind. Blood burst forth like a geyser, and the teen felt his stomach threaten to throw back up his lunch again. War made him feel queasy, and this was just not one of the better things in life he had ever planned on doing. Getting up close and personal with some of the scariest machines on the planet- the Metal Gears.

His companion lit another cigarette before firing off more shots and receiving more gunfire in return. Phantom grimaced. "Do you _always_ smoke, Snake?"

Solid Snake shrugged and leaned out once again, firing and hitting a man to the lung. He turned back and shook his head. "I smoke when I'm under pressure."

"You're disgusting sometimes. Smoking is bad for you!"

"So is war, kid," the war veteran replied grimly. He cocked his weapon and sighed. "How old are you again?"

Phantom crossed his arms before floating out and shooting multiple ghost rays. The bombardment created a small dust cloud, and the enemy fired blindly at the allies behind the barricades. He turned back to Snake and sighed. "Nineteen. Why?"

Snake gave a small chuckle before firing and hitting another man. Blood poured from the leg wound. "Just wondering. You never have really seen war until you've lived through it. And trust me when I say that."

The shots stopped coming, and both men looked out at the battlefield. Phantom covered his mouth with his hand and turned away from the scene. Snake just stepped outside and put his gun away for a moment. He turned back to Phantom, who looked about ready to throw up. "Let me guess," he told the hybrid dryly. "First time on a battlefield?"

"How'd you guess?"

Snake blew out a stream of smoke. "Judging by the fact you're acting as if you're about to wet yourself and see your lunch again… don't worry. I think it's happened to everyone before."

Phantom crossed his arms again, walking back into the alleyway and looking sick still. "Yeah. Everyone but you. You were born to fight in wars, weren't you?"

Snake was silent at this, and he took this as a 'yes.' The teen sighed and looked down at his torn-up jumpsuit, leaning against the wall. "So… about being in a war. What's it like for you now, Snake? I mean… well, you've been in so many."

"Exhilaration."

The teen blinked. "Excuse me?"

Snake turned his head and nodded towards the soldiers now moving out of the area. The bodies were strewn in the streets still, the stench of blood nearly overpowering Phantom's smell, but it seemingly unaffected the war vet's own senses. "You get a sort of rush when you're out in the field. A feeling of euphoria. After doing so many things and living through Metal Gear nearly killing me, watching my best friend die and Meryl nearly dying in my arms…"

"You feel _excited_ during war?!" Phantom couldn't believe what he was hearing.

The man shrugged. "You gotta feel it some time or another, kid. Don't tell me you've never had adrenaline pumping through your blood when you've been in battle. I mean, c'mon. You tell me about all these fights you had with Plasmius- or whoever it was- way back four years or so ago. You had to have felt _something."_

Phantom felt sicker then ever. He knew Snake was telling the truth, but he just didn't want to admit it to himself. "What if I did?"

"We all feel something in the midst of a fight some time or another, Phantom. It's only natural." Snake snuffed out the cigarette. "If you can't handle this stuff, why don't you go home or something?"

Phantom gestured around angrily. "Hello?! This _is_ my home! Or should I say, _was_ my home."

Snake let out a long sigh before taking out his weapon again. "True. If you're going to go and blame someone, don't do it to me. I've got enough over my head right now. And besides, I'm the one who's trying to_ destroy_ Metal Gear, remember?"

"Says you," Phantom muttered.

There was a sudden hail of gunfire out of nowhere. "Damn!" Snake swore angrily, ducking into the alleyway again. "Those bastards found us out in the open and were trying to lure us out!"

The teen looked sick yet again. "Now what?"

The other man was too busy locking, loading and firing once again. Screams erupted in the distance, and Snake kept shooting. Phantom could have sworn he saw a sort of twinkle in his eyes. Snake really _was_ enjoying this 'exhilaration,' as he so aptly put it. More blood poured out into the streets, and Phantom looked down at his hands. Green energy bore out of them. Destruction- could he really destroy the people that were invading the city in which he lived and protected? Amity Park?

Snake reloaded and cocked his gun again. "Are you going to stand there and be useful, or am I going to have to shoot you for being in my way?!"

Phantom snapped out of his gaze and looked out the way, his hands now flaming. Once again, he shot ghost rays and felt a slightly tingly feeling going up his spine- the same feeling he felt when he fought Vlad years ago… before the Disasteroid. Was this the sort of feeling Snake was talking about? And if it was, how come he didn't really notice it before? He shot more ghost rays. Did Snake feel this all the time?

More clicking, and Snake fired away, his face free from emotion. His sole intense expression was enough to let Phantom know that he was feeling the rush, but he wasn't allowing it to really overtake his very being. "So, you're used to this?"

Snake lit another cigarette. "Yeah. You sure you don't want one?"

"Naw. Like you said, it's kind of like war."

The man gave a chuckle before firing and getting one guy in the thigh again. The blood spouted forth like a geyser yet again. Snake got him in the arm twice, and the soldier fell. He looked back at Phantom. "Kind of like war?"

Phantom shrugged and fired more ghost rays. "It's bad for you."

* * *

**Huh. Well, that was an interesting experience for me. I'm not going to divulge how I did this, because I somehow DO NOT HAVE THE GAME. But I watched the thing on YouTube… I love Snake. XD**


	19. Return

**No crossover in this one-shot this time. However, it does take on a plot idea that I've had for a while. Only a little piece of it, however.**

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19. Return

_Always back to the same time…_

Ten years- it had been ten long years since he had last transformed into the hero that everyone once thought he could be. He could feel a strong sense of pain and agony rising in his chest as he stood inside the lab, which was covered in cobwebs and dust and smelling of mold. The man coughed slightly, shielding his eyes from whatever particles might have been rustled up when he opened the door.

Heck, it had been ten years since the ghost portal had actually zapped him. It wasn't like it was his fault that he wanted to give up his powers again. He thought he'd have a normal life again- that the city would quit hounding him for his unique ability to turn half human, half ghost. After all, only the entire school followed him around for the entirety of junior and senior year. He hated it, too- the publicity pressured him into doing one not-so-smart decision.

He went and got rid of his ghost powers again.

And here the man stood- inside of the lab with nothing but a broken down ghost portal and the thought of a city in chaos once again. Except the city wasn't in chaos because of him. No, it was their own doing this time around. They were the ones who had provoked a fight with the ghosts in the Ghost Zone. And he didn't have anything to do with the start of the battles that would ensue.

He wanted to help stop the fighting, but he knew that everyone would be so busy in following him around with a camera and trying to catch him in battle, thus risking their own lives to capture his on film.

So he left. He left the city when it needed him most. He left when the times got difficult for the people and turned his back on the ones he knew and cherished.

The man sighed and looked inside the large ghost portal, feeling emotion rise in his chest- anger, tension, fear.

But most of all, hate.

Hate for his home that had turned into a warzone. Hate for those who had started the battle against the ghosts. Hate for ones who threatened people for no apparent reason.

Hate for the one who nearly killed Samantha Manson and her child.

He stepped inside the portal and looked for a familiar button that had changed his destiny twice. It was hard to locate- the dust inside was so built up that it was have taken a miracle to actually get the first layer of dust off the device. Despite this slight setback, the person managed to locate the button and hover his finger over it temptingly. Would he do it? Would he dare go and help the city that had practically cast him out unknowingly?

Closing his eyes, he mashed his finger onto the button and heard the familiar whirring up of a motor. It wasn't as loud or as powerful as usual, as it seemed, but it did its job. There was a sort of greenish light the erupted from deep within the core of the portal, and the male turned to the source of the light, his eyes wild. _'I'm ready,'_ he thought, bracing himself for the shocking feeling of death once more. _'Throw me everything you've got! Hit me with all the energy you can muster!'_

As if understanding and reading these very thoughts, the whirring became faster and louder, giving the man the shock of a lifetime. He felt as if he was being struck by lightning for the sixth time, almost as if being tortured on someone's electric bed. A scream erupted from within his soul, and he let it out of his mouth, clenching up and taking in the power being given back to him.

Suddenly, as soon as it started, it was over.

The man fell over and landed on his back, a loud thud echoing and bouncing off the metallic walls of the portal, closing his eyes. He lay there for several moments, reliving his first time becoming the hero everyone thought he was meant to be. His fists clenched up, feeling cotton between his fingers, an old emotion swelling up inside of him. _'How long have I felt like this?'_ he thought, feeling tears try to fall down his face. _'So long ago, I was the one that everyone could count on, but now…'_

Damn it all.

He failed once.

He failed twice.

What if this third time was going to be the biggest failure yet?

His eyes opened up, no longer sky blue. They glowed a bright emerald green in the darkness, and he sat up, looking down at his hands. They were now covered and shrouded by a pair of white gloves. The man looked down at his clothing- a black HAZMAT suit… but there was no DP emblem on the front of it now. The mirror in the corner allowed him to see an older man with snow white hair. It was messy, strands strewn all over the place. Standing up, he could feel the power rushing through his body.

He had experience. He had done everything- saved the world, saved the city a few times, save his friends from danger.

Taking a deep breath, he willed energy to come forth and was comforted to watch a greenish flame light up his hands. Slowly, a wicked smile unfurled on his features. He had the power again- the power to create, the power to destroy. The smile faded, however, when he allowed the emerald light to disappear from his fingertips.

Swallowing, he allowed his body to relax as he took one step forward and looked up towards the ceiling.

It was time for the lost hero to emerge once more. Time to save the city from destruction. From pain.

From evil about to kill the last few things he had ever loved in his life.

He took a deep breath and phased through the ceiling of Vlad Masters' lab, flying towards Amity Park.

Danny Phantom had risen again.

* * *

**This is actually a big moment for me in a fic I'm planning out. I thin I gave a lot away here, but I don't know if I want to expand on this. I do have the option of doing it, seeing as the summary is in my profile. Only you can tell me if I did good. I'd love your feedback. Thanks for reading.**


	20. Romance

**It's cliché. And it's awkward. It's the first of my 'genre' series of chapters in this. Deal with it. I'm doing this first only because everyone else is and I want to get it done.**

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20. Romance

_And with only a few words, they were apart forever._

"We can't be together anymore."

Those words had pierced her like one stabs their victim with a knife. It hurt- it hurt unlike any ectoplasmic energy fist that Plasmius or Dan could have ever thrown at her hero two years ago. He stood there at the fountain with the ring in his hand. His eyes shone into hers, which were glistening with tears. "What?"

He looked away at the water. "Look, we've known each other for a long time. I know you want to continue to be at my side and everything, but it's not going to work."

She crossed her arms and sat on the edge of the fountain, shaking her head. Somehow, she knew it would come to this. She didn't want to think that this would actually happen some day, but it was inevitable. Fate hadn't been nice to them over the past couple of years, and today seemed to be the bombshell to end everything. The end of a path traveled for so long.

The end of the line to love.

Sam said nothing. She merely rubbed her arms together as the breeze blew in, and she turned away ever so slightly from her friend's troubled gaze. "You mean the typical 'you'll get hurt if you stay by my side' spiel?" she whispered, a hint of bitter laughter in her tone.

Danny shook his head. "Nope. I don't want to have a lot of drama in out break-up," he admitted. "No. If it were like that, then I would have had Paulina come and help out with getting a lot of cameras and other useless stuff. I just wanted to kind of make this a quiet thing. We don't need every single camera and news station in Amity Park watching us."

She shook her head, her shoulders shaking with what Danny couldn't distinguish as laughing or sobs. "Amazing, isn't it?"

He was confused.

"We always thought we would be together," Sam mumbled, her feet kicking the concrete ever so slightly. "But look at us now. We're just… we're about to be apart for maybe the rest of our lives. Who knows if we'll ever get back together."

Danny clutched his head. "We're going away for college! It's nothing that bad…"

"That's what you said when you went to go and face Pariah Dark," the Goth retaliated darkly. "_Vlad_ had to bring you back that time, and he was revered by your folks as a hero of the ages. '_Nothing that bad-'_ Danny, this isn't exactly going to be the easiest four years of our lives, and you don't want me to worry?!"

"I'm telling you, everything is going to be fine!"

She didn't say anything for a couple minutes, looking lost in thought. Danny didn't know if his words did the trick. His heart began sinking ever so slightly when he saw the look of realization really beginning to dawn on her face. Turning away and gripping the ring in his hand, he muttered quietly to himself, "I don't want to do this, but it's the only way we can truly drift apart so our relationship won't interfere with our stuff in school. And you won't be in the spotlight anymore."

She didn't reply. Not a sound was heard but the twittering of birds as the two seniors awaited each other's responses in silence. Danny scratched the back of his head in embarrassment.

Finally, Sam spoke once more. "So, this is really the end?"

Danny nodded finally and looked down at the ring. "Yeah. I think it is."

"What are you going to do with the ring?" she asked, keeping her arms crossed and her voice at a slightly bitter level.

He looked down at the infamous "Wes" and clutched it tightly in his hand, looking down at the water. Danny bit his lip. "Do you want to keep it?"

Sam shook her head. "Don't you want it?"

He shook his head as well. "No. I was wondering if you wanted it."

"We should put it somewhere where we'll remember all the times together," she told him.

Danny fingered the ring and looked down into the water. "We could toss it in there," he offered, fingering the piece of gold with an engraving on it.

She gave him an odd look. "Why in there? We hardly ever came to this spot."

The raven-haired teenager sighed and sat down next to the fountain. "This break-up is not the easiest thing I've ever done."

"What is?"

"Fighting the Box Ghost," he admitted, getting a bit of a snicker from his companion.

She took the ring from his hand and looked down into the crystal-clear waters of the wishing fountain, turning her gaze towards the ring and heaving a sigh. "It's been wonderful to wear this ring on my finger for the past couple of years," she told the teen quietly. "I've had a really fun time being your girlfriend and everything."

Sam turned her hand slightly and watched the ring descend into the glass waters. The jewelry landed in the water with a small _plink,_ journeying towards the bottom of the fountain. The former couple's eyes watched as the ring hit the concrete and bounced slightly before settling down on the floor. Danny and Sam looked at each other, feeling the same emotion: grief and sadness.

The Goth took a shuddering sigh. "I'm going to miss you, Danny."

"I'm gonna miss you too, Sam," he replied, scoping her up in a tight embrace. "I think the best years of my life are gong to be the ones I spent with you."

She sniffled slightly and shook her head. "We can always see each other on vacations and everything. We'll make more memories as best friends, Danny. I promise."

Danny broke the embrace and looked into her lavender eyes. "I promise that too, Sam. Everything is going to be fine. You'll see."

She nodded quietly. Her eyes traveled to the fountain.

All her teenage life, her years spent with the ghost teen of Amity Park- it was down at the bottom of a pool of water, along with a gold ring with the word "Sam" engraved on the inside.

* * *

**EW. –brushes off tongue in utter disgust- EW, EW, EW. I did my romance. Now tell me I'm a sap and need to get something else out and FAST.**


	21. Crime

**Did I do this on purpose? Nope. Kind of just… spewed out of me.**

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21. Crime

_Death is the sound of a heart stopping and feet running._

The branches smacked his face mercilessly as he rushed through the woods, trying his hardest not to turn back and see if anyone was coming. His face had blood on it, a stripe from his ear to his mouth. The breathing was ragged, his hand clutching the bloodied knife and trying to find a place to put it. He didn't know what had happened. The only thing he had seen was the sight of the female in a puddle of blood.

Danny's shoelace caught a stick, and he flew forward, face meeting the dirt. Pieces and bits of dirt and particles landed in his mouth, creating a disgusted reaction. He shook his head and spat out what he could, clamoring to his feet within seconds. He needed to get out of there now. No time to waste.

He grabbed the weapon in his hand and continued moving forward, his heart racing at an abnormal level. Endorphins kept pumping, even as he moved deeper into the woods. They didn't seem to give him a sense of security- actually, it felt as if they wanted to give him more of a feeling that he was being watched. That he was going to get caught if he stopped and tried to take a breath.

The whole thing had been a blur. He had no idea what had happened. All that he remembered was seeing the scene, collapsing to his knees and feeling his stomach rise into his chest. He had never seen a person he loved in her own blood before. He saw the knife next to her body. He looked down at his hands, which were covered in blood. His mouth was dry, ears only registering small sounds. The pounding of feet down the stairs told him his father must have heard the noises in the lab.

He didn't expect Jack to stand there and stare at Maddie for some two minutes before collapsing to his own knees. Tears leaked from his eyes, his hand going towards his wife's body. He shook his head. "Maddie…"

Danny finally managed to stumble to his feet and walk over to his mother's body. "Dad, I… I couldn't stop him…"

Jack's head whirled to Danny, and he merely stood there. His eyes bore through his son like nothing Danny had ever felt or seen before. The teenager backed up against the wall before his father finally pointed out the door and shook his head. "Go. Hurry up and go."

"Dad…"

"Go!" he practically shouted at the top of his lungs. "Danny, I don't want you getting caught here with her!" His eyes leaked large tears as he sank to the floor. "My god, I just… I can't…"

Danny looked down at the floor and felt sickness rising in his throat once more. Slowly, he walked over to the body and picked up the knife on the floor. He shook his head and gave a small noise in his throat. It sounded like a muffled goodbye, but no words came forth. His feet carried him to the upstairs area and began to make his way to the door. The phone rang when he was just about to leave, and he stood at the door for several moments. It rang, waiting for him.

The teenager slowly walked over to the phone and picked it up. "Hello?" he asked quietly.

_"Danny?"_ a female voice asked, concerned. _"Are you okay?"_

Sam.

He swallowed. "I can't talk right now, Sam. I'm kind of busy."

_"Busy? Danny, what happened?"_

The receiver was back on the hook moments later. Danny was out the door less than seconds later, and he was running down the street with the bloodied knife in his hand. Not one person seemed to take notice in the boy running down the street with a knife in his hand. They didn't seem to notice the blood running down his hands. In fact, no one seemed to be looking in his direction as he ran.

He ran as fast as his legs could carry him. They led him straight to the forest, where he now ran for his life.

All he could think was the repeated thoughts of _'Shit, shit, shit…'_

That was when he fell, spat up the dirt, grabbed the knife, and ran again…

And fell once more.

Danny gasped as the knife cut his hand, tumbling out of his hands. He met dirt and stayed down for several moments before trying to clamor to his feet again. As he stood up, there was a groan from next to him in the darkness. He gasped and looked around frantically. A cough was heard, followed by a long sigh. "Who's that?" the voice asked.

The teen froze. He knew that voice anywhere.

"Come now. Don't be afraid to answer an old man."

Danny laughed bitterly. "Old? You're forty, Vlad! That's not really old!"

A quiet sigh. "Oh, it's you. You're on the run from that man too, aren't you?" He sounded weary, hurt. "Daniel, now is not the time to be arguing with me. I'm on your side."

"That's crap. You're trying to turn me in, trying to frame me for something I did wrong!" The teenager was on his hands and knees, sifting through the dirt for the knife. "What do you want from me? I know you're trying to get me to sympathize with you, but it's not going to work, Plasm-"

"Don't call me that."

Danny stopped and looked up. Vlad was still leaning against the tree, his face looking furious in the dark. The teenager matched his face and was ready to spit back a retort. His hand found the smooth edge of the blade, and he felt around for the handle as best as he could. He kept his voice carefully calm, words warily spoken. "What's wrong with you?"

The billionaire laughed bitterly. "I've been accused of a crime I didn't commit."

That stopped the boy dead in his tracks. "What?"

"You heard me. I've been framed. And now I'm wanted by the whole city. Didn't you hear about it on the news?"

Danny sounded stunned, frightened. "Who are they saying you murdered?"

Vlad snorted. "You wouldn't care anyways. No one of major importance, if that's what you are implying." He gave another sigh. "What are you doing out here anyway?"

"Mom was killed."

Silence. A twig snapped.

Danny was pretty sure Vlad's next words were going to either punch him in the gut or have some sort of fake remorse laced into the words.

Amazingly enough, it had neither. Vlad, in fact, sounded worried. "W-what do you mean by that?"

"_Murdered,_ you fruit loop!" he yelled. "Killed, stabbed, gone to a better place! Mom's not here anymore! And I'm going to get framed for it because I was at the scene of the crime!" He was panting, exhausted suddenly. "I don't know what to do. I just…"

There was not a sound form the billionaire in hiding. Danny was surprised, to say the least. He was waiting for a backlash, anything. All he heard, though, was the ragged breathing coming from his archenemy. The teenager finally found the handle of the knife and picked it up from the dirt, eyes brimming with tears of pain from the cut moments before. He bit his cheek and held the weapon in his hand.

"Dead," Vlad whispered.

"Y-yeah."

The next words out of Vlad's mouth pretty much shocked Danny into reality.

"Who?"

"I dunno."

"When?"

"Today. Why?"

Vlad sounded angered suddenly. "So we can find the person who did this, you fool! Why else?!"

Danny froze. _We_ can find the person? A team-up?

Was Vlad out of his mind...?!

* * *

**Pffft. Plot bunnies can be so evil... seriously.**


	22. Adventure

**You really do not want to know where this one came from. You really don't.**

**Crossover with Ultimate Spider-Man. Yeah, that high school Parker with a crapload of issues. It shines with a lot of angst.**

**WARNING: Very dark. Gritty Teen rating for swearing and blood and violence.**

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22. Adventure

_They were doomed- both of them._

The first word he thought as he fell ten stories was, '_Shit.'_

Actually, come to think of it, that was his next word he thought of, too.

Spider-Man knew that he was probably going to die in a matter of seconds. It was inevitable. The switch-off of villains with Phantom had proved to be one of his more deadly mistakes he had made. He grunted, raising his arm and trying to fire out a web that could connect with the side of the building. The string came out, and for a moment there was a glimmer of hope for the web-slinger.

But hope didn't exactly want to work with Spider-Man today.

A red ghost ray came out of nowhere and burned right through the web, leaving the teenage hero with the dim thoughts of how much he hated ghosts. Following this, a set of black-gloved hands grabbed him by the neck from behind. They began to grip his trachea, blocking any air was trying to enter his body. He tried to scream, but there was no noise that would come from his mouth. He felt so damn helpless.

_'Shit. What happened to you, Phantom? Where are you?!'_

The vampire-like ghost laughed manically and flew towards the rooftop of the Claire Dyers Building, keeping a firm grip on Spider-Man's neck. The clear night let all witnesses watch the fight that was transpiring and scream for someone to help out the hero in the hands of a murderer. No one answered his or her cries, though. The other hero who would have come to help was unconscious on the Dyers Building, outfit ripped and blood forming a pool around his mouth.

The ghost's voice was raspy. "You are indeed a hero to New York City, Spider-Man, but you will _never_ amount to anything while living in Amity Park! Why bother helping these fools? They've done nothing for you but shun you and embraced Phantom even more!"

"Y-you… lying… bas…"

The hands tightened more around his neck. "They hate you. They always have."

Spider-Man's fists tightened in rage. Freakin'…

And suddenly, the hands let go of him; dropping him in midair and watching him fall like a boulder. The teenager didn't even bother to fire out a web, coughing and watching the ground move closer and closer to him until he finally met concrete. There was a cracking sound, and he was faintly aware that his backside was hurting like hell on earth. He rolled over slightly and gave a loud moan, his eyes landing on Phantom next to him.

The ghostly hero was lying there with his mouth wide open and eyes tightly shut. Scars and other wounds decorated his body, making him look like a bloodied Christmas tree. Spider-Man inched over as best as he could to Phantom, giving him a slight nudge. "Phantom? What the hell happened?"

There was a groan from the ghostly hybrid. His eyes flickered slightly, and he opened one eye. "I got the crap beaten out of me," he mumbled bitterly.

At least that spark of hope he had lost a couple of seconds ago was back.

Phantom slowly propped himself up onto an elbow and rubbed his bloodied glove through his hair. "He's a maniac. Osborn, I mean."

"Told you so."

The two boys said nothing for several more moments before Spider-Man once again attempted to ease himself up. He managed to get on one arm and stood up slowly, feeling a wave of dizziness overcome him. He tore off what was left of his mask and gasped for air, pain surging through his muscles. "This is… this is _insane._ How the hell are we supposed to beat those two psychos working together?"

Phantom stood up as well and gripped his head, wincing. "Not so loud. And I don't know. But I do know I'm bloody and look worse than hell."

The hero from New York looked at his companion. "If you look like hell, I have to look like some sort of _demon spawn._" He swayed a little and placed his hands on his knees, bending over and trying to get more air circulating through his body. "Now comes the hard part- where did the two run off to? They can't be finished with us yet."

As if on cue, there was a roar of a creature and a whoosh of air that sounded like something flying through the skies. The two heroes looked at each other for a split second before the green demon landed on the rooftop, his tattered purple cape flapping in the breeze. Phantom let out a low growl and summoned emerald energy to his hands. Spider-Man- now an exposed Peter Parker- clenched his own fists. "You don't when to give up, do you?"

Goblin grimed sadistically. "There's no such thing as giving up, Peter. It will always be a fight to the death between us."

"You're going to be the one who's dying tonight," the ghost teen snapped, firing a ghost ray from his hands.

The energy blast was swatted away with a lazy flick of the wrist and a harsh laugh. Goblin glowered at Danny and snarled, lunging with such agility that the teenager had no time to react. He was knocked into the back wall with a jaw-shattering slap across the face, screaming all the way. Peter fired double-webbing shots at the monster and pulled as hard as he could. "No!"

Goblin laughed. "You're ours!"

"That's right," Plasmius's voice spoke out of nowhere. "You are both ours."

Phantom groaned pitifully. "I won't give up against you! Either of you! I can't!"

Peter sounded soft, angry. "I won't either. I'm sick of this bullshit. You two have caused nothing but pain for all of Amity Park! Damnit, just…"

The hybrid billionaire floated up from behind the building walls, smirking. "Oh, you'll succumb to our wishes, my boy. I'm quite sure of it."

In his firmly gripped hand was the head of an unconscious Mary Jane. The hybrid threw her onto the rooftop and watched the body bounce once before slamming into the ground and lying there. Peter's voice caught in his throat, backing away in shock. Phantom looked at the body with wide eyes. He coughed and doubled over, blood spurting out onto the concrete. No. It couldn't be.

She looked… alive. But barely.

"Bastard," Phantom spat, tears beginning to stream down his face. "That's what both of you are! _Bastards!"_

Goblin chortled, watching both teenage heroes fight their angry demons that threatened to blind them with fury. "You want to watch her die? Wish to see her killed before your very eyes? If not, I suggest you show us respect. Both of you."

The two teenagers stared at Mary Jane on the concrete.

Oh, no...

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**YES, Ultimate Spider-Man is pretty much this dark. Maybe it's because I love it that much that I did this one... If you have never heard of it, go look it up NOW. It's amazing. Seriously.**


	23. Poetry

**Some joyous update this is.** **-sarcasm-**

**For **miniStardust **(on dA)**

**

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23. Poetry

_Death is full of poetry in and of itself._

Blood seeped through my hands  
The liquid of life and death  
I killed a person  
And I felt… a rush.

A rush of nothing ever encountered  
Something that I would love to feel  
Again and again  
The feeling of death

It may be an act against life  
But I couldn't care  
That adrenaline pumping through my body  
Is all I want

The look in her eyes when my hand was there  
Against her bosom so fair  
She was pleading for mercy  
But I didn't care at all.

The hand glowed red with energy  
My lips curled into a smile  
I unleashed the ghost ray  
And a scream echoed in my ears.

I loved it  
I'll do it again and again  
And soon, everyone will fear me  
My power will be unmatched

No one will defeat Dark Phantom

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**Free-verse poetry.** **Cheers.**


	24. Horror

**Um… hi there. I haven't done anything in here for quite some time again, and I thought I would update this thing for the first tie in ages. Remember I'm also doing my genre fling as well… so let's try the horror genre. And what better way to show off the horror genre than give you something with- zombies? Yep. And a little bit of a video game a lot of people know about.

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**

24. Horror

_Since when did Amity have to deal with both zombies and ghosts?_

No one had ever seen anything like this since the Raccoon City incident. The only reason Amity was on the map and a hot spot in the news now was because it didn't have very many citizens left in it. Either they had fled or they were completely destroyed by the T-virus now sweeping the city. It was impossible to say who would have come back to fight the gruesome zombies or move as far away as possible. He could not help but fly over the city and shudder in disgust at the number of citizens-turned-undead creatures. The funny thing was, it wasn't even his fault this time.

His feet touched the rooftop, crossing his arms and scowling at the zombies roaming the streets and moaning like the typical B-rated movie. "This is like a horror film gone wrong," he mumbled to himself, shaking his head. "Disgusting. They're even wielding those damned shotguns or hatchets or whatever they are."

"What's the matter in ruling a city of the undead? In essence, you're ruling a city of the immortal then."

The body turned around, eyes narrowing at the sight of another man on the same roof. "Hmph. You again. I could have sworn that you had called off the meeting with Masters for a good reason. Why the hell did I have to come here when there's no point in roaming around with a city full of… _zombies?_ Honestly, I don't know what the point is in anyone coming to this city anymore- much less live here." He scowled. "You told me you would explain what happened, so start explaining!"

Night had fallen on Amity Park, but he didn't bother to reach for his sunglasses. "I don't have to explain anything to you," he responded casually. "If you're going to treat me like dirt, there's no point in actually telling you what has occurred to make these citizens how they are now." He took a step forward. "By the way, I never caught your name. Thought Masters was going to drop by, but I see his lackey decided to come instead. He's not scared by all of this, is he?"

"Masters tends to be a little bit of the queasy side," he admitted, disgruntled by the being's questioning observation. "But that's not the point." He rolled his eyes. "The name is Vlad Plasmius, but keep it at Plasmius for short. It makes everyone's life easier, if you understand what I mean." A smirk unfurled on his features. "You got a name?"

His companion returned the sneer and looked towards the undead below them. "It wouldn't make much of a difference if you knew it right now, to be perfectly honest. If you make it through this encounter, tell Masters that he can come and find me face-to-face next time. I hate the people that a worker sends to these sorts of things. Kind of annoys me, if you know what I mean." His fingers cracked slightly. "You ever seen anything like this in your life, Plasmius?"

The half-ghost scowled at the gesture. "I've seen ghosts, if that's what you're implying. You do realize you're in the ghost capital of the world right now, correct? You wouldn't have seen zombies before this last week." He laughed dryly. "I'm sure that breaks your heart in multiple places." Tiny magenta sparks flared from his hands. "Now, tell me. What happened here?"

"So eager to discover the master plan, are we?" the other man replied calmly. "Hmmm. I'll tell you _something_ that happened here. An infamous virus that Umbrella managed to get into a system of some sort somehow infected your town. Not quite sure how- no, I'm sorry. I _am_ sure how. I just don't feel like telling you."

Plasmius growled. This guy was trying his patience. "You'd _better_ tell me."

Zombies groaned below, making for a sort of monotonous hum in the background. Fires licked distant buildings, coming closer and closer to not only FentonWorks, but to the destination of the two men that were speaking as if on pins and needles. The hybrid's hands flared with pink energy. "If you _won't_ tell me, I'll make this a bit more than a stupid conversation between two business men!"

Eyes behind the sunglasses gleamed happily. He looked ready for a challenge. "Is that a threat, Plasmius?" he questioned tauntingly.

He fired a ghost ray in his foe's direction, followed by a hopefully swift punch to the stomach- only to find that he had disappeared.

Out of nowhere, a fist landed in his gut, followed by an elbow to the face and a jarring knee straight up. Plasmius' eyes widened in shock at this- a human with that kind of speed had to be something special. He couldn't retaliate; immediately, he found himself being dragged by his cape, flung up, and slam hard into the rooftop where he stood. Snarling and lashing out, Plasmius' fiery hand smacked against skin and felt the hands drop. His vision cleared, he could clearly spot the business male in front of him grabbing his arm. His foot came forth, slamming into his solar plexus and taking him out under his feet.

'_He can't be a human. Maybe he's some wretchedly powerful zombie or something.'_

His voice was tight, garbled in his throat. "What the hell are you? Who are you?!"

The body was close to his face again, sunglasses slipping off to reveal a pair of red slits and a malicious smile forming on his face. "I'm not as human as you thought I was, Plasmius. I've become something more powerful than any ghost, human, or half-ghost creature could ever hope to become. I've become… _immortal."_

"Impossible! No one is immortal!"

He leaned away and snorted, the smile still lingering on his lips. "And I suppose you know of another human that has super speed, super strength, regenerating abilities, and the one simple fact that I know about the city and myself." He glanced down at the zombies now eating what appeared to be a living, screaming female, rolled his eyes, and turned back to the half-ghost on the roof. "They're all infected with the T-virus."

Suddenly, it clicked. Plasmius' eyes widened with shock. It couldn't be true. He stood up slowly and faced the other human with a dumbfounded look on his face. "W-what? But- what business do you have here?! Why infect this city?"

"They have ghosts coming in and out of portals, you fool. Why infect just humans when you can also infect ghosts?"

Plasmius stared at him hardly. "So- you really are _him_."

The sunglasses slipped back on, voice smug with pride. "You can call me Albert Wesker, Plasmius. Or should I say- Masters?"

There was a loud scream as something sounding distinctly like flesh being ripped from a body was heard. Wesker gave a sadistic smile.

Plasmius blinked. '_Oh, shit.'

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_

**WESKER IS SCARY AND BADA--. Okay, I'm good. Yes, I did a Danny Phantom cross with the video game of surivial horror, _Resident Evil._ Oddly enough, I think this would make a really decent crossover. Psycho zombies, ghosts of craziness, creepy half ghost, sadistic man with superhuman powers- I think it would all work out in the end. And besides- who would not love to see Wesker see Danny for the first time? -grins-  
**


	25. General

**Hey, look. We're a quarter of the way there. And yay. I know I'm failing more and more as time passes. What'd you expect?

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25. General

_Team Phantom- they had never really changed that much._

Their team was small, insignificant. Honestly, though, it was one of the best in the nation. Comprised of nothing but brains, brawn, and crazed individuals, they patrolled the streets of what was now merely known as Amity with their eyes open to any crime and any suffering person in need. Each person had grown because of personal issues, but they stayed together as one unit, one single strand of friendship holding them together. After so many years and so many hardships, it was a miracle they were still the best ghost-fighting team known.

It was now 2020. Team Phantom had definitely expanded beyond the reaches of the three teenagers of the past. Now it included three new individuals, all of whom decided to sacrifice their own benefits for the good of the city. Well, maybe not _all_ of them, but it was pretty close. One gave up the rest of her college days to get a PhD to aid with the psychological aspect of ghosts. Another gave up her hatred and pure desire to kill him. (It didn't mean she _didn't_ dislike him) And yet another risked her own personal well being to help her family even though she knew she had to hide from certain individuals. All of them amounted to heroes in the shadows, sure, but they knew their efforts were well received by the community.

The heroes who shined in the light were the original members of Team Phantom. Amazingly enough, Daniel J. Fenton, Tucker Foley, and Samantha Manson were all still together and fighting ghosts with their newest team members Valerie Gray, Jasmine Fenton, and Danielle Phantom. There had been a lot of issues in the past regarding their time together, but now they were practically an unstoppable force. Nothing bad could be said about them now.

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"_SHIT."_

Danny Phantom grinned and very nearly laughed at Tucker's swear outburst through his earpiece as he took a battle stance against what seemed to be a rather large hoard of ghosts with nothing better to do than rampage the city. Now twenty-nine years old and a single man, Phantom wasn't living with the others at their headquarters downtown. He was making himself live in the dumps of the city where not even the police force dared to venture. The others wondered why he decided to make this decision, and he claimed it to be personal reasons. Everyone knew, though.

He was still trying to clear his mind of Dark Phantom being on the loose and the simple fact that Vlad Plasmius had returned from space and was now in hiding from the world's prying eyes.

That was the least of his problems as he flared his hands with his trademark green ghost energy and suddenly shot a ghost ray to one of the nearest goons. "Take a deep breath, Tuck," he quipped, kicking on of them in the side. "At least these guys aren't so much a threat as they are a nuisance."

"_Danny, look. I know you really want to just have some fun with this right now, but honestly, this could be a distraction or something! Remember the last time you didn't take a group of guys like this seriously? Ember nearly had all of Amity in a trance with 'RemEmber.'"_

Phantom groaned at the memory and proceeded to smash his foot into one of the ghost's stomach. How could he forget that little fiasco? Sam went on his butt for two weeks to ingrain in him that every ghost attack pretty much had some sort of purpose, even though it might not have been seen from the outside at first. He itched his new suit and grumbled, pulling on it and hearing the elastic snap. "Hey, Jazz- remind me to wash this when I get to headquarters, all right?"

The older sister rubbed her head on the other end and sighed. "_I made that suit for you so it __**wouldn't**__ have to be washed. Are you telling me that it's not doing its job?"_

"I'm telling you- ow!- it's itchy! Maybe something with the sweat is incorporating into the fabric or whatever." Phantom grabbed one of the creatures and threw it into the wall, firing a ghost ray towards it in the process. "I still like this thing, though. It gives me a lot more maneuverability against these guys. You've gotta give me the design plans for this thing. I might need another one in a bit."

With this, he watched the other entities fly off in a sort of fear in the other direction. Phantom crossed his arms and smirked, cracking his fingers. "Well, that's a wrap," he told the others cheerfully. "What else do we have to do today?"

Silence.

"Uh, guys? Hellooo? What's going on?"

"Hmmm. You might have grown older, but you still have a bit of that childlike innocence I've always tried to admire in you." The voice had aged dramatically, and the shadow hovering over Phantom only made him more suspicious. "And the fact I don't even have to say the words anymore clear show how much this world and the ghost world has changed so drastically." The adult half-ghost turned around and gasped in awe as he spotted Clockwork floated there, smirking and changing into his child form. "You haven't changed at all, Phantom. I'm actually quite impressed."

Phantom grinned widely and laughed, the barren streets filling with glee. "Kind of hard to, I guess," he admitted. "Old enemies and everything seem to enjoy coming back to haunt me every now and again. Go figure." He cocked his head. "So what are you doing here anyway? I mean, it's been a long time and everything since I've seen you."

The Ghost of Time raised his staff and gestured to a portal. "Well, we have a bit of catching up to do, but first… I want to show you something, Daniel. I'm not sure if you'll like it, but- it might be for the better."

"_Daniel"-_ how long had it been since he had heard that name? He couldn't remember as he jumped through the hole in space and time and followed an old ghost ally into the unknown.

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**Um- I offer no witty remarks to this? Shooooot, I'm losing my touch! –insert loud wails here- Thanks for even coming this far.**


	26. Exposed

**Oh hurr. I forgot I had this thing. Not really, but Jesus Christ. A whole year of no updating? What the hell is wrong with me- besides lack of want and need? Erm, a lot. A lot has happened. A LOT HAS HAPPENED. Just ask, oh… EVERYONE.**

**Crossover love. Again. Bahaha. This time with Chuck. Want a little more? Come find me on my newest account here on FFN- **Aqua Zephyrus. **Made it because I am sick and tired of the shell I have built around myself. I wanna be- me. I just want to be me and nothing more. **Shining Zephyr **is going to be pretty dead in a while, guys. Just go find me at my newest one. …please. **

**Thus said, enjoy this little wee bit of love. And sorry for OOC-ness. Derp.

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**

26. Exposed

_This wasn't exactly what he had in mind._

"He's a bit crazy."

"Yeaaah, Casey likes his gun to do the talking most of the time."

The agent merely shook his head, walking out of the room and scoffing to himself. Two nerds in the same room pretty much meant a case of the crazies for one man working with the government. And God help Morgan if he came into the room as well with Casey in there listening. The last thing he needed was Tucker Foley, Chuck Bartowski, and Morgan Grimes- all whom couldn't fight worth the lint in their _pants._

He grimaced at that thought. What an analogy.

"Hey, uhm… Casey?"

Great. The Fenton kid. The wuss. He turned around, and to his honest surprise, it wasn't him.

It was Phantom. The real American hero. And he was watching him with this worried look in his eyes as if he didn't know if Casey was going to strangle him or not. Almost _exactly_ like the Fenton kid… Casey's eyes narrowed, but he kept his voice cool. "Danny Phantom. Thought you were somebody else for a minute."

"Sorry if I, uh- scared you," the teenager told him uncertainly, making circles with his fingers in the air. "I just- you know." He cracked a slight grin. "Wanted to make sure you were okay and everything. I mean, after you were ambushed at City Hall and everything."

Casey raised a brow and glanced around for a moment before leaning in and nodding. "Your help was- appreciated. Never dealt with that sort of thing before. Now I know how to deal with it the next time something like that comes around." He turned to Chuck and Tucker, who were babbling about some video game. "Not to ask the nerd."

Phantom blinked at this and shrugged. "He doesn't seem like that bad of a guy, though."

"You'd be surprised how much damage he can inflict."

Silence at this remark. Phantom continued to watch Casey as he sat on the couch and looked deep in thought about something. He floated there for a long few moments before finally landing on the floor and walking over to the NSA agent. "You sure you're going to be okay? I mean that was probably the first time you ever _fought_ ghosts or something."

Casey scoffed softly. "Nothing a little cleaning up can't do to make these wounds go away. I'm not that badly hurt."

"I beg to differ."

"This coming from the hero who saved the world from an incoming asteroid and has a file in the CIA database all to himself. You should get yourself checked out with all _your_ wounds, kid." He smiled dryly. "Physically and emotionally."

"Don't you get emotionally hurt sometimes?"

Casey's smile dropped in a heartbeat. Phantom knew he had hit a hard nerve in this question and bit his lip uncertainly, taking a step back when his companion stood up and glared at the teenager. "I don't let my emotions cloud my judgment—unlike yourself, Phantom. You constantly let your anger of Masters coming back and Plasmius being more powerful than you get in the way of your fighting. And _that's_ why you fail."

Phantom clenched up slightly at this. "Hey. Thank to those emotions, I actually can kick his butt sometimes! Sure, it might not be all the time. But at least I _do!_"

"Yeah right."

"Last I checked, _Agent Casey,_ you were the one under fire, and I was the one saving your sorry ass!"

Before he could give out another biting comment, the teenager suddenly doubled over in pain and grabbed the table. Casey was at his side in an instant, grabbing the teenager as he clutched his sides and yelled in utter agony. Two rings split across his body, and Phantom's eyes widened with horror as they moved in opposite directions.

Casey moved back in shock as the kid slumped over on the floor and moaned softly. Raven hair, rumbled clothing, and blinking cerulean eyes- how the…?

Danny Fenton stirred a bit more, holding his head with one hand and glancing at the NSA agent before freezing. Casey looked absolutely stunned. He couldn't move, his mouth dropped open and eyes wide with shock. John Casey was _never_ surprised in his life. But this—this was a real shock.

The two of them merely stared at each other for what seemed to be an eternity.

"…y-you saw that, didn't you?" Danny finally stammered out.

Casey nodded, shutting his mouth and pursing his lips into a grim line. The kid looked shocked. There were certainly people around the world who knew Danny was Phantom, but not Casey. After he found out the world was saved, he didn't stick around for ceremonies. He went right on back to what he did best—finding the bad guys.

He took a deep breath and growled lowly for a moment. "You could have told me, moron."

"How the hell was I supposed to know you weren't with the Guys in White? All you FBI agents kinda all look the same with the suits!" Danny was obviously flustered. "And then you tell me I have an _entire_ FBI file on my ghost side! That only makes my powers screw up even more when I'm anxious like—"

"Just calm down for a second!" Casey barked finally.

The kid hushed, staring at him now as Casey sat back down on the couch and groaned a bit. "You're not in any trouble as far as the law is concerned, kid. You're fine."

Danny relaxed a little.

"I just you would've told me first so I could have called you for back-up."

"…so wait, you would have used me?"

"Sure. We'll be blunt."

"…you are a jerk. A real jerk," Danny growled.

Casey merely grunted under his breath, "Get used to it, kid."

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**Yay. Done. I'm writing a little more… I think. Hope you all enjoyed this one.**


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